


Sometimes The Hard Part Is Living With Yourself

by AnonymizedUserName



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Alabama, Gen, Georgia, Zombie Apocalypse
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-05
Updated: 2017-02-23
Packaged: 2018-05-31 08:39:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 20
Words: 59,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6463366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymizedUserName/pseuds/AnonymizedUserName
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>One young traveler survives the beginning of the zombie apocalypse. And she might manage to survive the worst of humanity. A stranger, far away from home, trying to hold herself together against the madness of the end of the world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hitting the ground hard.

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: This is a Walking Dead fan fiction. Given that, there will be violence and sex. However, this is not an erotic fiction or a romance. It's a story of survival and personal growth.
> 
> Comments are welcomed, and appreciated. Also, I'm bad at adding tags or posting in the right groups or general site mechanic stuff. Post any advice you think I should hear in the comments.

Apparently, we were some of the first to suffer from the rise of the undead. I say that because we hadn't heard anything on the news, nothing. At least I hadn't. I didn't normally watch the news, but there weren't any announcements on the PA system at Salt Lake International. No one huddled, talking about the coming apocalypse in the terminals, either.

No one looked sick boarding the flight. The biggest commotion was the folks with middle seats rearranging themselves next to windows and aisles when we realized the flight was only about 3/4ths full. I did hear a few of the flight attendants talking about how creepy it was that someone was wearing a windbreaker with the logo of a funeral home on it. Who wanted to advertise about a job with dead bodies? And it was a hot day.

I paid no mind, excited to be sitting down in coach, looking around the plane with anticipation. It was going to be my first time out of the country. My dad was on a six-month deployment in Tallinn, Estonia. I wasn't sure why, but it had something to do with Russia and Ukraine. Apparently, there wasn't much to do there, and since my dad was first sergeant for a "second lieutenant that actually knew what the fuck he was doing, if you can believe it," he arranged with my Mom for a trip to Europe. Europe! Even if it was the eastern part that was supposed to be crappier, it was still Europe. Better, I got to stay on my own in a bed and breakfast while my dad stayed on the base, since family members weren't allowed on forward-whatevers. It was going to be AWESOME.

There was screaming and yelling several rows back only forty minutes into the flight. Some guy went fucking bonkers. Attacked a flight attendant. He wasn't Middle Eastern, so no one thought terrorism, which was dumb, considering the history of white terrorists. But I guess the guy behind him gave him a good whack with a heavy laptop and they locked the crazy guy in one of the bathrooms. Which was creepy - I didn't even know the bathrooms could be locked from the outside. But that's what the captain said over the intercom. I couldn't see much since I was pretty far forward in the plane. The flight attendant who was attacked rushed past me on the way on the way to the front galley to get first aid, with a bite on her hand! Holy shit. It didn't look bad, though. The pilot said we'd continue on to Atlanta, which meant the idiot wouldn't cause me to miss my connecting flight, so eventually I settled down and started watching Hot Fuzz. Good movie.

Just about the time Nick Plegg was leaping through he air and firing two guns at the same time, which was awesome, the intercom came on and all we heard was "FUCK!"

"The HELL?" Then blood-curling screams, loud thunks, and the plane lurched to the right, then started banking hard. Some guy in the aisle fell right into the laps of people on the other side of the plane and the change in momentum forced me to lean in the aisle, giving me a good view of my ginger ale hitting the floor. "FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!" Something was smashed, the plane shuddered. "Ladies and gentlemen, get in your FUCKING SEATS RIGHT FUCKING NOW. PUT ON YOUR FUCKING SEAT BELTS." I put on my seat belt. The pilot's voice actually got a bit quieter, more tired, as he yelled. "We're landing NOW." The plane pitched down, and began a rapid descent. I couldn't see past First Class to figure out what was going on, so I looked through my neighbor's window, she was clutching her throat and praying hard, and I saw the ground coming up awful fast.

I pulled my pillow from the bag on the center seat, and braced myself. I heard flaps whirring, the plane leveled out, slowed down really fast, and then BAM! I smashed into the seat in front of me, flopped to the right, hitting my head against the armrest of the guy across the aisle, and heard tearing metal behind me. And when I say tearing metal, I mean a horrible ear-piercing screech that added to the disorientation of everything moving at once all around me. I lost consciousness for a second, largely from the g-forces and whiplash, saw blue sky above me, and realized we were tipping down and just about all of the plane that should be behind me was over on the right. Hot liquid sprayed over me. It tasted like blood. I screamed, saw water pouring down the ceiling into first class, and then figured out I was hanging by my seat belt as the nose of the plane sank.

I'm not entirely sure what happened after that. I definitely had a head injury. But I know I got my seat belt off, climbed back over my seat and more or less watched the plane fill up and people drown. Later on rescuers said that the water was pulling the nose forward as it rushed down, trying to flip the plane all the way upside down. But the rear of the plane was still connected on one side, preventing the plane from totally tipping over. By the end of it, I was swimming, until coal-black arms pulled me out of the water, a kind face gave me mouth-to-mouth, and I spat up half of Weiss Lake.

Weiss Lake, Alabama, they told me. The boat made it most of the way to Center, which is a really stupid name for a town, before someone said that the Cherokee Medical Center was full, or closed, or something. Eventually, I found myself at Cedar Bluff High School in, well, Cedar Bluff, where the locals really went all-out to help the survivors. There were only ten or fifteen of us, and our stories didn't make much sense.

I still had my phone with me, but it was broken after the swim. The school let us use their phones, and I called my mother, who burst into tears after finding out I was all right. I could hear it in her voice when she was telling me how happy she was I was all right. Happy, maybe, but she was sobbing. Very weird. My mother never cries. She's always very happy. A follower of Surya, she does her best to keep her face "as sunny as India on her best day". I was never one for religion, but even I noticed the lack of a blessing from my mother when she passed the phone to my brother. He told me that he loved me, another shock, my brother is fourteen and never says stuff like that. Then he told me to get food, hide it, and stay away from anyone strange. Then, in a rush, "I'm sorry Amrita, sorry fo..." and the phone cut out. Just like my mother to run out of battery on her cell phone.

No one in Cedar Bluff really knew what was going on, though a nice fellow from the town helped clean the the cut on my head. Eventually a representative of the FAA arrived from Atlanta, around seven in the evening. After casserole and "funeral potatoes," what a horrific phrase, were provided by a few ladies from one of the local churches, the FAA guy started conducting interviews. Soon we were all so fed up with how he never answered any of OUR questions, that we stopped cooperating until he told us what he knew.

A radio call came into Atlanta Air Traffic Control from our flight announcing an emergency. Apparently the chief pilot opened the door so that trash from lunch could be given to the flight attendants, the injured flight attendant stumbled in and attacked the co-pilot, straight up mauling him. The pilot fought her, and finally she dropped when he stabbed a pen in her eye. But not before she took a chunk out of the pilot's neck. A very important chunk, including part of the carotid artery. The chief pilot died first, the second-in-command called an emergency and crashed in the first bit of water he saw before passing out from blood loss. The fifteen or so of us who survived were picked up by locals. Fifteen out of over two hundred people on board. Which made me wonder what ELSE happened on Lake Weiss that meant the Cherokee Medical Center was full.

Taking a big breath, he asked the assembled survivors about the incident at the beginning of the flight. The first two interviewees didn't know much. When we put our heads together and recalled the details, I was the one who mentioned the bite on the flight attendant's hand. The FAA man went pale, and said "holy shit". Then he pulled out his iPhone, opened his browser, and showed us these grainy cell-phone videos reporting about riots breaking out in old-folks homes with nurses looking scared out of their minds swearing that old fogeys had begun attacking the staff, even getting up out of walkers and ignoring arthritis. Then, in the middle of that, all-seeing Google popped up with a new notification of a brand-new related video, a news report on a white riot-turned-massacre in Detroit where a bunch of people who worked for Chevrolet apparently invaded a black-majority tenement and were brutally killing the residents. Screams could be heard from inside the buildings as police slowly mustered down the street. Which made me think something was SERIOUSLY off. White people are always scared of black people. At least those stupid enough to hate other races are. How could any middle-class Detroit white person not be scared shitless of the slums? Hell, I'm a five foot-one inch 100 pound Indian girl (the subcontinent, not Native American) and certain white people still shoot me glances like I'm going to knife them or steal from them or something.

The FAA guy left that night. In the morning, when the school principal set up a TV for us, we saw a wave of mindless minorities from the slums in Detroit attack a line of riot cops through a thick cloud of teargas and rubber bullets. But none of them had any #BlackLivesMatter signs or peace signs or any normal protest stuff. Whatever the news anchor - national news now - was saying about revenge and rage and poverty, this didn't seem to be about race. By the afternoon, the news started reporting problems in FEMA camps outside Detroit only an hour after saying they'd been set up. Then the news from Detroit shut off, the Emergency Broadcast System started listing local resources in Alabama, and the radio was talking about some nasty new influenza that had spread from China to most of the world almost overnight.

That evening I watched moonlight play across the lake and wondered about the bodies and the plane below the peaceful-looking water. I didn't even know what part of the lake to look at. Lake Weiss is really large. The previously friendly townsfolk were already starting to shun us. The owner of a BBQ place told me he wasn't serving any "diseased Asian niggers" and literally pushed me out of his store. Like I'd eat there after that! So I had Chinese.

It was surprisingly good Chinese for a small town in the South, so when I started puking during the middle of the night, I didn't immediately think food poisoning. Then after my stomach was empty I was willing to guess food poisoning. Until I kept on dry-heaving even with an empty stomach. Come to think of it, I didn't feel like I had food poisoning. I was also tired, and maybe I was starting a fever. Then I did the smartest thing I'd done since asking about a spare neck brace after arriving in Cedar Bluff. I went down to the all-night mini mart, bought as much Gatorade and pretzels as I could carry, and hauled it all back to the school.


	2. Fever Dreams

I didn't want to share with my fellow survivors, and my head felt fuzzy, and something made me want privacy. I was shaking by the time I opened the small, unused theater and dumped my purchases inside the door. Then I went to the gym, saw people tossing and turning and smelled vomit, dry heaved some more, and took two gallons of water from the buffet line the funeral potatoes ladies set up. When I went back for another gallon and a big bag of even more pretzels that the American Airlines refugees hadn't gotten to, I saw one of my fellow passengers get out of their cot, stare at ME with hunger, and start walking towards me. I froze in fear. She didn't look human. I don't know what I would have done if she hadn't tripped over another cot and fell on another sick refugee. I heard growling and shrieking as I left the room, too scared to look back at what was going on.

When I got to the theater I moved all my stuff to the tiny backstage, desperate for a place to hide. Finally I saw a ladder, painted black against a black wall, that led up into a hole in the ceiling. I crawled up into that pitch-black hole, found a tiny reading light, turned it on, and found myself in a cramped space for running the rudimentary lighting system and looking at an asbestos warning. Ignoring the warning, I slowly brought all my water, Gatorade, and food up to the lighting cubby. I closed the trap door, turned off the reading lamp, and passed out from exhaustion.

When I woke up, my eyes had adjusted to the darkness and I noticed a glow from one of the walls in my cubby. Turns out, a window looked out over the theater, where I'd left the lights on. A heavy black curtain covered the small window, which was only about six inches high and a few feet across. I had a fever, I knew that much. I felt so hot, and I wasn't quite thinking straight. In fact, I felt quite proud I'd protected the other refugees from my sickness. But eventually I realized I also needed to pee.

Opening the trap door, I carefully made my way down the ladder. Crossing the theater to the door leading to the hallway, I tried to remember where the bathroom was. After I opened the door, all such thoughts left my mind. There was an empty school hallway. Empty except for bloody footsteps from one end of the hall to the other. And they were... off. One of the sets of prints looked normal, but the other was skewed to the side. Like someone with a messed up knee ran down the hall. Or, something. Was it really blood? I knelt down to look. Yes, it was really blood. I didn't know what to do.

Fear decided for me. I heard heavy steps heading towards the hall from around a corner, and it spooked me. End-of-a-ghost-story spooky. When you're scared out of your mind, know it has to be fiction, but you obey anyway. I closed the door of the theater hard, and ran behind the curtains on stage. My heart jumped again and I stifled the gasp when something slammed against the door. Then... nothing. No one tried the handle. I stood, totally still, for a good five minutes, until I couldn't hold it anymore. Shaking, I finally pulled down my pants, squatted, and peed right there on the stage.

Totally gross. I got some on my shoe too. Ugh, I wanted to gag. I couldn't believe I did that. What the fuck? The action snapped me out of ghost-story mode and I almost just walked out into the school to find out what was going on. But some instinct stopped me. Instead, I slowly climbed up the black ladder, careful because I was still light-headed, and crawled into my cubby. I ate some pretzels, drank a mouthful of water, and promptly passed out again.

When I woke up, I ached all over. And I was cold. Hot, too. Drenched in sweat, any movement swept air over my body and sent a chill through me. Staying still made me feel hot. I was also really thirsty. I drank half a bottle of Gatorade and went back to sleep.

The third time I woke up, I was still sweaty. Still feeling off, but not as bad as before. I remembered what had happened so far, and immediately felt a flush of embarrassment. Gods, had I really peed backstage? How on earth was I going to explain that to the school officials who let the refugees stay here? Were they looking for me right now? I opened the curtain, took a deep breath, and looked at the theater, sure there was going to be a team of people looking for the stupid girl who peed all over their school during a fever dream.

It was already staring at me. As soon as I looked out over the lighting controls and through the window, it was already looking directly at me, like it knew I was going to appear. A woman, middle-aged. Overweight. Food smeared over her mouth. Chest rising and falling with anticipation, mouth opening at the sight of me. Her hands were also covered in brown, and there were splotches on her clothes. While I was frozen with embarrassment, a stray thought noted that the chocolate, it had to be chocolate, was the same color as an old blood stain. By the time I had the thought, she was already moving beneath me, heading for the ladder.

I crawled over to the trap door, opened it, and tried to make sense of the situation. Who was she? Did she also have a fever? For some reason I had absolutely no doubt she wasn't going to care that I peed on the floor earlier. Which left me oddly reassured. When I opened the trap door, I was getting ready to climb down and figure everything out. Then I saw the woman climbing up. Without grace, but also without care. She saw me, opened her mouth and... moved her head up. Neck stretching, trying to get her mouth closer. A hiss escaped her lips. There was meat in her teeth. Meat. Then I saw the handle sticking out of her back. Just sitting there. A knife handle. Sticking out of her back.

My first thought was that it was a really convincing prop. Then she was near the top of the ladder, grabbed at my foot, and hissed. My instincts kicked back in. Something was WRONG, and fever or no, I wasn't letting this woman grab me. I yelled "don't!", closed the trap door, and started hyper-ventilating. The woman pushed the door up, and I yelled at her to go away, and stomped on the door. There was a moment of quiet, and then scrabbling sounds, and the door crept up again, pushing against my foot. She must have climbed up more and really gotten close, in order push against the ladder with her feet. In jerky movements, the door tried to open, and my foot slipped. The door popped almost all the way open, the woman using one arm, her neck, and a shoulder to open the door despite my leg pushing on it. I panicked when she reached inside, still rasping from the back of her throat. I grabbed the end of the nearly open door, felt her fingers on my ankle, yelled "no!", and jumped on the trap door. It closed on her, with my full weight on it, but not quite all the way. She was still resisting, pushing. It didn't seem she had enough leverage to force it open against my body weight.

And then I saw the fingers. Just fingertips. Cut off by the edge of the trap door. The snap I heard when she fell back and it closed. Dirty fingertips, covered in muck, not bleeding much. But... no that wasn't chocolate. It was caked, dried blood on them. What the FUCK? It was about then I realized she was still pushing against the door. Not making any progress, but I could feel her pushing. WHAT THE FUCK? I cut off a woman's fingertips. Why isn't she crying? Going to a doctor? Should I give them back?

NO.

No fucking way was I going to let that trap door open. I sat on it, kept my full weight on that trap door, pulse racing, panicking, trying to not feel trapped in a small dark place with FINGERTIPS SITTING NEXT TO MY KNEE.

I don't know how long I stayed on that door, two hands on the handle, pushing down, maximizing my weight. SomeTHING pushed back for... minutes... hours? I have no idea how long. Could have been 20 hours. I had enough adrenaline coursing through my veins I could have stayed awake for days. It was at least two more hours I stayed there after whatever it was STOPPED pushing against the door. Took me at least that long to work up the nerve to open the door again. It could be waiting, hoping I'd open the door, ready to grab me again. Finally I realized it had to be done. The fingertips were still there. Next to me. I couldn't kick them away, into my food! Into the darkness where I'd have to search for them. I shuddered at the thought. So they were still there. I might have passed out on that door without moving, but for those fingtertips. The worst part was the smell. It was rank, and familiar. I'd smelled that same smell somewhere before. Only once. Where... Jessica's house. My family was vegetarian, but Jessica's ate meat. And once she had to throw out bad pork. That's exactly what the fingertips smelled like. Rotten pork that had been left in the fridge for too many days. Finally, I stood aside, held onto the door handle with all my might, heaved it up, swept the fingtertips, FINGERTIPS, out of the hole in the floor with my foot, closed the door, sat down on it, and cried. After I stopped crying I ran over to the window and closed the curtain as fast as I could. I couldn't see her as I closed it, which reassured and frightened me. I ran back to the trap door, laid on it, and fell asleep. I woke up several times, scared out of my mind, certain I heard noises. But I didn't open that door. I didn't leave that door. I stayed on it, using my body weight as a lock.


	3. Out of the Frying Pan

I guessed it was a day or two later when I was squirming in pain, in desperate need of relieving my bowels. The empty Gatorade bottle with my urine in it looked oddly natural. But this wasn't going to fit in a bottle. I considered dumping the big bag of the pretzels on the floor and using that bag, but I didn't think I could stand the smell in such a small place. I could already smell myself. I crept over to the window, pulled up the tiniest corner of the curtain I could, looked out at the theater, and saw no one. Maybe twenty minutes later I worked up the courage to open the trap door after taking off my pants and my underwear. That was surreal. I squatted over the opening, took a big, painful shit, gave one ineffective wipe with the Gatorade bottle, and dropped it down below as well. Then I closed the door, and tried not to hyperventilate. Nothing happened once I got my breathing under control.

I started to realize that I was having real mental problems, and it wasn't going to get better while I was in the cubby. I was also still sick, though not as bad as before. But it was not a good idea to go outside the cubby. It wasn't a good idea for... I don't know how long. It felt like days. I ate as little as I could, easy to do with the flu, drank as little as I could, and, once every few sleeps, looked out the curtain. Once I saw the woman, and another, when I pulled up a tiny corner of the curtain. The woman was missing fingertips. I don't think they saw me, but I was back on the door before thinking about it. A few minutes later, something pressed against it. I held back a scream, but nothing happened after a minute or so of light pressing. The things didn't move like humans should. I'd started to think I'd imagined half of it, that maybe they were looking for me, and that idea was gone again. Something was WRONG.

I wouldn't find out how wrong until I ran out of food and water. I estimated I'd been up in that cubby for at least four days, maybe six, before I left. I didn't have any way to tell the time; my phone had been killed by the lake. My estimate was based purely on how long the food and water lasted... and how many times I opened the cubby to defecate down on the theater floor. Finally, I had to leave. The sickness had largely gone, and it made no sense to wait around to get weaker. After so many days I was also starting to wonder if maybe, maybe I'd overreacted.

I tried not to look at the splattered shit at the bottom of the ladder. I succeeded, more or less, but couldn't do anything about the smell. I ran to the other side of the stage before succumbing to dry heaves. That occupied me for a minute or two, and then I had to face the door. It was ajar, with a few splotches of blood at hand-level on the frame. Maybe from where someone bumped it and didn't have FINGERTIPS. But then why the hell wouldn't they be holding their injured hand close and keeping it protected?

I chickened out and searched the back of the theater again, hoping beyond hope there was a back entrance I hadn't seen. There wasn't.

Eventually, I was back to the door by the hallway. I peeked my head out of the doorway. It was staring at me, church-lady from hell, mouth still caked in dried blood, hand still missing fingertips. It lurched towards me, mouth ajar, looking HUNGRY, from the far left-end of the hall. Where it could see in three directions. Later, I wondered if that was instinctual. At the time, I screamed, loud and shrill. But I wasn't quite the helpless girl I hated in horror movies, my feet moved too. I took off running the other way down the hall, at top speed.

I avoided the bloody footprints on the hallway floor, even though it looked dried, but as I reached the other end of the hall, connecting to the main entrance of the school, I didn't see a pool of slightly wet and sticky blood. The school's colors were white and dark red. Which turned out to be unfortunate for me. My foot slipped enough that I lost my balance, but stuck enough to the congealing blood that I pitched forward instead of losing my feet out from under me. Now that I'd reached the main entrance and the hall perpendicular to the one with the theater, I was already looking to my right. Two more people were lurching towards me, covered in gore. FUCK ME.

My shoulder landed hard, hurt, and I slid forward until my head smashed against the school's trophy display case. As I struggled to get up I saw shiny things and a baseball bat. That'd be nice to have right now. For what? I was already running towards the school entrance. To kill people? Oh, gods, I'm thinking of killing people.

I'd hurt my shoulder, hurt an ankle but not too bad, and I was ignoring it. The glass doors of the school beckoned me. It was light outside, bright. But my eyes weren't hurting. Please, Ganesh, let the doors be unlocked. Please. Good gods, am I praying? I never pray.

Then the door slammed open. I was momentarily stunned by the impact, but the handle bent, the hinges worked and I was outside. It was overcast, and heat washed over me. The house ahead and to the left was on fire. Not just, oh, that's worrisome better-call-someone-because-there's-some-smoke, it was a four-alarm blaze, this-is-going-to-burn-down-the-whole-town ON FIRE. I turned to my right, yelling for help and running in front of the school. As I passed by one of the classrooms I saw Marilyn, a fellow survivor, banging on a glass window, already partially open, trying to get out. I ran to her, yanked the window farther down. "Marilyn, get out of..." She grabbed my hand and pulled, mouth opening. I screamed again, leaped back, hurting my ankle again, and fell down on the grass.

As I got up, shaking with adrenaline, I looked back towards the school entrance and saw three of them, led by church-lady, coming at me. Screaming for help again - I didn't care how much it sounded like a damsel in distress - I started running. My screams finally attracted attention. Something came out of one of the houses up the street, missing an arm, and started moving at a fast lurch towards me, the remaining arm held up for balance and pointing at me. Oh fuck, they're zombies. They're fucking zombies.

I reached the corner of the school's fence and veered right. Zombies and fire behind me. A zombie ahead of me. Houses to the left, it was only a three-way intersection. That left right. I ran, fast. Shit, fuck. Shit, fuck. Fuck. Shit. I reached the southern edge of the school building. Looking to my right I saw the football field, and another airplane-survivor zombie. Billy Bob. The fucker's name was really Billy Bob. Billy Bob the zombie. I laughed. I couldn't help it. Then the laugh turned into a cough. That didn't make any sense. It wasn't funny! Ha, ha. I was out of breath, so I fell, skinning my knee badly again. Hurting my ankle just a bit more. It was still mostly okay. It better be.

Why was I on the ground? Eventually my gasping for breath gave me an answer. I had collapsed. Adrenaline pushed me to run too fast and my lungs were burning. Billy Bob was closing on me, faster than I could walk, slower than I could run. Holy fuck, they really are zombies. I looked left, and another came around a car, too close.

I got to my feet. Focus, Amrita! I got myself moving again. Not sprinting. Jogging. I could handle this. Yes, it hurt. Oh fuck, my ankle hurt. It wasn't so much the pain as the worry it would give out. It was holding. It's holding. I reached the main road and celebrated. I was under control. UNDER CONTROL. Focus, Amrita. To the right the road goes past the marina and then it's a causeway that goes across the lake. Straight ahead it passes by the eastern shoreline of the same finger of the lake before going who knows where. To the left, the road passes by the Quick Mart where I bought the Gatorade. Gatorade would be nice now. Shut UP, brain! Billy Bob and fucking church lady are behind me. There's a three-car wreck by the Quick Mart. Oh god, something's moving.

The marina, a boat. YES! I turned to the right. It looked clear ahead. Thank you, Ganesh! Stay to a steady jog... stay to a steady jog... I was getting tired, but I could make it. Into the parking lot, all clear. Between the Weiss Lake Motel and the Lakeside Cafe. Stay in the middle of the alley. Remember that one that popped from behind a car when you fell down. Don't get within arm's reach of ANYWHERE you can't see. Keep going. I don't see any boats tied up! There are more piers. Remember that walk you took soon after the crash. That's a screen door sound. Behind you. Zombie coming out of the cafe. That's ok. This one looks healthy, except for the blood around the mouth. Might be fast. Get past the edge of the hotel, where you can see most of the docks. Now I can see one of the boat ramps... no boats. A little farther. No...

There were twenty to thirty zombies in the main parking lot/drive-around of the marina. All turning to look at me. I started breathing harder, panic rising. Turning to my left, something coming out of the trees. Behind. I gasped, but I didn't have a scream in me. Cafe zombie! I forgot! How did I forget already? It was almost on me. I started running straight ahead, pushed too hard, lurched forward, caught myself with my hands. Shoved off my left ankle HARD. It held, barely. Kept running right into the water. I pushed forward in slow motion, trying to keep good contact with the lake floor as my arms sung wildly, frantic with my suddenly slow speed due to the water.

Cafe zombie followed me right into the water, a huge splash behind me and my head caught. It had my hair! I threw my head forward, finding good purchase on a rock with one foot, and felt something tear on my scalp. Then I swam, swam as hard as I could. But it caught my foot anyway. Cafe zombie was taller than me, could stay standing in deeper water. I had to swim. But to swim I had to go horizontal, and my foot came into reach. He pulled me back and I could do nothing, nothing. I had nothing to hold onto but water. It pulled my leg back, trying to get it within reach of his mouth. I bunched up, effectively pulling my entire body towards cafe zombie. I felt something clamp onto the toe of my left shoe, and I was fully bunched up and I KICKED with my whole body. The zombie's head snapped back as my left foot broke some teeth but gave me no push, but my right foot hit the center of his chest and I broke free, had a little momentum in the water, and swam like my life depended on it.

When I looked back, I couldn't see it. I panicked, kept watching, and finally saw it's head pop up, gasping for air. They did need air, or was it some remnant instinct? It was about ten feet behind me, but turned away. It turned back towards me, walked towards me until its head was under water. I kept swimming. Finally I saw it again, farther away, again with its back towards me. It turned around, started at me again... finally I realized that it was walking until it couldn't breathe. Some instinct pulled it back, but then it wanted to get me again. I was safe. In deep enough water. I swam out farther, and then started treading water.

It was harder than it should have been, since my whole body was shaking. Shaking hard. Fear started squeezing me again. I could drown here. I twisted around, looking for something. A boat. That was a boat. A wooden, old-school fishing boat. Dinghy! It didn't seem to be moving. I lashed out, straining for it, getting a mouthful of water for my troubles. Fuck. Remember falling down. Don't panic. You know how to swim. Barely able to control my own body from the panic and the adrenaline surging or wearing off, I couldn't tell anymore, I swam for my life, again. Seeking that wooden beacon of safety. Eyes on nothing but the promising walls of the boat.

When I finally got to it, I was exhausted. My arms felt like jelly. I slowly reached up my right arm, and the boat seemed to help out, tipping towards me. Then a shadow fell over me, as a huge man, must have been at least 270 pounds, towered over me. I couldn't figure out for a second why he was standing up in the boat. Until I saw the mouth drop open, the HUNGER. He stepped towards me as I whispered: "no." The boat tipped hard as the huge zombie fisherman towered above me. I was out of adrenaline, so I didn't panic, and just took in a huge breath.

Then the bulk, flailing in the air, slammed into me, hard, and we both went into the water. Body and water was all around me, and for a moment I had no idea where I was, which way was up. My face took the brunt of the blow, which really wasn't the worst place on the head to be hit, my neck hurt, and something was churning in the water. The zombie. I pushed against it, hard. Got nowhere. Oh gods, it's arms are wrapped around me. I already knew they couldn't swim, or at least one couldn't. I was going to drown out here in the middle of fucking nowhere.

But the zombie was twisting, turning, disoriented by the fall and the sudden immersion in water. It didn't let go of me, but suddenly I felt air on the back of my neck and I realized the abrasive material on my face was a life jacket. The zombie turned on its back, head and shoulders above the water, my nose barely above the neckline. It was pulling me up, out of the water, letting me breathe. Up towards its gaping mouth. I tried to ignore it's grasping hands on my back, pulling hard on my shirt, hooking into my bra. The mouth and the waterline were all.

With all the thrashing, I managed to wiggle my own arms free and push back against the zombie's jaw. This put my nose back underneath the waterline and destablized the zombie. And then it pushed its chin down, my fingers felt its lips. Oh, shit. I pulled my hands back and the zombie pulled me back above the waterline and I could breathe again. I didn't know what to do. I held my hands to the side as the zombie pulled me up its chest, closer and closer to death. I flailed against its sides a few times, weakly hitting it. That did nothing. Church lady had a knife in her back. Did I really think the softest punch in the world would kill it?

The next few seconds were nothing but terror as I inched closer to the zombie's waiting mouth, hands grinding against my back. As I got closer and I started to feel its mouth lapping at my hair, I did the only think I could think of. I stuck my thumbs in its eyes. It didn't care, which scared me as much as its mouth trying to eat my hair. Trying again, my fingers caught a cut on its forehead, giving me enough leverage to really push. One eye popped out of its socket, which seemed to give the zombie pause. Apparently it COULD feel something.

But it didn't scream in pain. It didn't flinch. And after a second, it started pulling me up again. I could feel its lips on my scalp, cold breath on my head. I gripped with my left hand, pressing my thumb into its good eye, while with my right I closed my hand over its extended eyeball and yanked. The whole zombie shuddered. So I did it again. And again, until finally the eye came out with a big root behind it that must connect the eye to the brain. I threw the eye behind me into the water and threw up against the chest of the zombie in a single motion. Or tried to throw up. It was only another dry heave.

For a moment all was still, except for the gentle lapping of the water, and I just held on. Then the zombie twitched, started pulling me again. What did it take to affect these things? One big effort on its part pulled my forehead above the level of his chin. I reached my right hand back, and jammed two fingers in its open eye socket. My index finger and my middle finger, longest on the hand. I reached inside, twirling my fingers around, doing my best to grab brain matter. The zombie began to twitch again, losing control of itself.

Grabbing its hair with my left hand, I pulled myself up higher on its body. Its back was almost parallel to the water now, head starting to sink into the lake; I was riding the zombie's chest. I kept digging with my right hand, while my left worked at pulling out the other eye. I had to pull out with almost my whole weight to yank the second one out. The zombie gave one more great lurch, turning on its side. The motion plunged me back down underwater, but I didn't let go of its skull. With both hands I dug into its head, doing whatever damage I could. Finally, I knew I needed to breathe soon, so I pushed back and separated from the corpse.

My head finally broke the water under my own power and I took a huge breath, tears dripping from my eyes. I took a few experimental sobs before I composed myself and looked for the boat. It was already at least thirty yards away, floating on a stronger current than I thought the lake had. It made me want to go back to crying. I didn't think I could easily hold myself onto its curved back, and I was sure I couldn't flip it back upright.

I stayed where I was, getting more and more tired while treading water, worry growing again. Finally I turned back to check on the corpse. It still wasn't moving. But my eyes were drawn to the colorful design on its life vest. Shuddering in horror, I started swimming back to the zombie, not really trusting its stillness. I screamed when I ran into a floating eyeball on the way back, flinging it aside in a last burst of adrenaline-fueled panic, and getting a mouthful of lake water for my trouble.

After gasping for air, I got myself moving again until I could grab onto the bulk of the huge zombie. It was face down, so it took me awhile to feel around for all the clasps to undo them. The zombie was so large I had to drop into the water and submerge myself to get to the clasps. It was even longer before I could wrench each arm out of the large life jacket. I had to jab both of my feet into the corpse's hips and use my whole body's strength. As soon as I had the life jacket free, I pushed away from the zombie with both legs, trying not to think about what infected brain-tinged water might be doing to me. That thought got me to shake the vest in the water as best as I could, hoping to clean whatever nasty was on it off. But eventually I had to just rest on it, exhausted.

After the second time I fell off the life jacket, I figured out how to put it on. It took a few attempts. The first was almost disastrous, leaving me sputtering water and struggling to regain my breath after a bad dunking. I finally got it on normally, and then the too-big jacket popped right off, my arms shooting up from the pressure of the jacket. I fell through it, and had to struggle in the water to get out from under it. Eventually, exhausted, I figured out I could fit my torso through the neck opening, the shoulder straps folded underneath my armpits. The jacket worked fairly well in that position, and finally I could rest without worrying about a mouthful of lake water.

My exhausted body took the opportunity to go limp, and I slowly twisted around from my own momentum. This did not provide reassurance. There was a lot of lake around me, but the Cedar Bluff marina was not far off, nor the southeastern shore of that same finger of the lake. And on the shore, everywhere it was nearby, there was a zombie or two every few meters, looking out at me and testing the depth of the water. They were hungry. And they were not going to forget about me.

I didn't know what to do, so I just floated, slowly nodding off, watching Cedar Bluff High School catch fire, feeling a light rain start to fall, and letting a few tears go myself.


	4. Others

I woke up to coal-black arms pulling me out of the water and immediately relaxed. Which was dumb, it's not like being black would protect you from being a zombie. And I should have been frightened that I feel asleep when I was floating in a lake and trying not to. But soon I was looking at the same broad lips, strong cheekbones, and friendly eyes that rescued me from the lake after the crash, and I felt safe.

"Sure she's alive?"

Someone else was in the boat. Pale, dirty beard. I jerked back in horror, before wondering if zombies could talk.

"Heh. I don' look that bad. See, is like I's tellin' ya, Jasper. She feel safe with you 'cause you her kind, she know I ain't. We belong with our kind, how God intended." Wow. The other guy was a genuine southern racist.

The redneck was in the back of the small speedboat, holding onto the engine's handle. My rescuer turned to me, and with his back to the redneck, rolled his eyes. "You all right there? Say somethin'." I realized all the sudden he had both my wrists in one big hand and the other on my upper chest, so I couldn't lurch forward. He wasn't sure I wasn't a zombie.

"Thank you. Thank..." Something in me broke. I was so cold, even though it was warm outside, and I just kept shaking and crying a little.

My rescuer hugged me then. "I'm Jasper. You're okay now. You're okay."

"Chalk one up for the good guys." The racist pulled the cord on the engine, starting it, and began steering the boat. "I'm Jim, welcome to my boat."

Jasper waited a few minutes before asking what happened to me. I didn't answer. I was just too tired, mentally and physically. And a big part of me was obsessing about the lake water, hoping it cleaned off all the filth of the last few days so Jasper wouldn't think I was gross.

"Fire's still growing. Gettin' right nasty. Gonna cover the whole town, if'n the wind turns." Jasper looked up at Jim's comment. I turned too. "Mebe burn up the Z's."

Smoke was rising over Cedar Bluff, and there was a big central flame, probably the high school. Jim was certainly thinking ahead. Most of the town was fine, though the fire was certainly bigger than when I'd left the school. I'd seen zombies and plane crashes and seriously weird shit, but this sight threw me for a loop. It was a big fire. And weirder than everything else was that no one was doing anything about it. No sirens. No helicopters, no nothing. It was just a fire. That's when I realized things were totally fucked up. You don't just let a town burn down. Okay, maybe what the fuck Zombies, and the government doesn't know what to do. But they know how to handle a fire. The government was gone. It just struck me. There's no more United States of America.

Holy Shit.

I immediately started minimizing. It's a small town. There's zombies! Maybe the government will get back to it.

But I didn't believe myself.

And I felt vulnerable. Okay, there's racist cops all sorts of crap, right. But it's the United States of America. If someone calls me "diseased Asian nigger" and shoves me out of the restaurant, well, I probably couldn't sue successfully. But that's about the worst that could happen. Because the government guarantees that people like, and especially like my mom, who goes to temple all the time and prays to the gods, we get to ignore the Christians yelling idolatry and have a normal life. A good life.

What if there's another guy like that restaurant owner and he just kills me? He could. Because there's no United States of America.

I felt a little more scared of Jim, and a little more like I needed to look out for myself. I turned away from the fire, scratching my chin on the huge life jacket I was still wearing. Cedar Bluff and the fire was to the right and behind the boat, the causeway behind and to the left. Ahead of us was an island in the lake about football field or more from the town, connected by a road. It looked like that's where we were headed.

I could see a little dock filled with boats and three big houses on the tip of the island where the road ran from it to Cedar Bluff. There were a LOT of people, maybe two hundred, in the yard between the biggest house and the other two.

Jim noticed me look away from the fire. "That there's Buffington Island. Named after grandpappy Jared Buffington or some such. I got a little house on the far side of the island. When the flu hit, everything just kinda shut down. Then the dead started rising, most of 'em kilt by the flu, and the living out and panicked. Nasty shit. All the smart ones come out here. You can see why."

The people in the field between the houses were watching the fire, talking in nervous groups. A line of ten very serious looking men, all white, stood across the road leading to Cedar Bluff. Three of their rifles bucked, the gunshots rang out, and a zombie fell, sixty yards away from the men and the huddled Buffington refugees.

Most of the crowd flinched, though a few stout-hearted (and stout-bodied) women ignored the shots and continued cooking over huge camping grills.

I lurched as Jim ran his boat up on the shore - how did I not notice that about to happen? Too much to pay attention to. "You can take that off now." Jasper began helping me out of the jacket.

Jim leaped ashore and raised his hands in triumph. "Saved another one!" he yelled. The crowd cheered in response.

After he got my jacket off, Jasper knelt down and looked me in the eye. "What's your name, girl?"

"Amrita. Am-ri-ta." I said it slow, knowing non-Indians had trouble with the name. "Thank you for saving me, sir. Again, I think. Sorry I didn't talk, I just... too much..."

"That's ok, Amrita." Jasper said my name right, which was nice. "But you ain't safe now." Jasper was quiet, but intense.

"Man named Steven, not Steve, Steven, he's running the island. He owns the big home on the point there, and he's the one giving out the food that's gonna run out who knows when. Whatever the truth is, you tell 'em the flu hit you hard, but you got through it. They locking the ones who ain't got the flu yet somewhere, and I don't know what's goin' on there.

"I came into town on the third day, still coughin' and snot in my lungs, but mostly better, with my little sister in my car. Steven welcomed us in, gave us a room in a home from someone what didn't make it. There's twenty-something places on this island. My sister, flu got her the next day. You know what that means."

No, I didn't know what that means. What did that mean?

"Steven's wife came in and took care of my sister. Big 'ole Colt .45. Quick. A little messy, but quick." Jasper looked at his hands. "I'da done it. Shoulda been me. Not some white b... that's mean. I don't mean it. But it shoulda been me. Would've been me.

"I stopped my car at the red line they painted on the road over there, and Steven's men came up to look us over. Steven let us on the island, sick sister and all. He told me we'd have a place to stay, and food, so long as we worked hard. I told him we could do that. He nodded, friendliest guy in the world, told me they needed good men like me. Then he told me: 'one more thing. You know you boys shouldn't be carryin'. I know, it's tough times, but we gotta make sure things are done right. You want to come in, you gotta leave the rifle with us, so we can make sure it's used right."

"What could I do?" Jasper was talking more to himself than me. "He gave me a choice, but the dead already got my girlfriend. I couldn't go back into town. At least here, my sister had a fighting chance." Jasper looked me in the eyes again. "You ain't Amrita no more. You're Amy or Rita, or some such. And you watch yourself."

Another set of rifle shots rang out. I jumped, but calmed back down quickly, knowing it was another dead zombie, not a threat. "I will. I'll be careful."

Jasper nodded seriously, and we both got out of the boat.

Jim finished tying up the boat, raised his fists, and addressed the crowd. "We saved another one!" He got a pretty good cheer out of everyone, which made me blush.

One of the larger cooking ladies came up carrying a plate, and Jim introduced her. "Girl, this here is Mary Ann. Mary's just about the most important person on this whole damn island, after me. She's gonna be managing the food."

"Oh, stop." Mary waved at him.

"Girl, you talkin' yet? Give Mary Ann your name."

"Rita, my name's Ri-Rita." I reached out to shake Mary Ann's hand, and my hand started shaking. My whole body started shivering uncontrollably. Now that things seemed halfway normal I could see how cold I was from the lake. Which wasn't a very cold lake, but I didn't know how long I'd been in it.

"Heavens to Betsy, she's freezing. Jim, what are you doing wasting time with introductions? Come on Rita, there's a fire going in front of the house. You can warm up there."

Jim put his arm around me and started leading me through the crowd to the fire. For some reason, I tried not to look at all the new people. Maybe because my eyes were glued to Mary Ann's plate. "Do you think I could..." I tried to hold my finger steady and point at the food.

"It's just a hot dog and some greens, the greens ain't even cooked." Mary Ann reconsidered. "Sure honey, go ahead."From the boat, looking north, it seemed like the entire horizon was one big wall of flame.

I immediately took a small bite out of the end of the hot dog, and then another. I could tell it wasn't the same quality as the dogs I sometimes had at my friend Jessica's place. But I didn't care. It tasted better than anything I'd ever eaten before. I stood right there and finished eating it, and the greens too, before I started walking again.

"Thank you. Thank you so much." I was about to cry, and Jim put his arm around my shoulder again.

"Fire's this way, Rita."

"What have you been through, dear?" Mary Ann looked more interested than concerned.

I sat down in front of the fire, suddenly feeling better than I had since the plane went down. I could almost relax. Almost. "I was on the plane, the plane crash."

"Oh, my." Mary Ann put her hand on her chest. "So terrible, on top of everything else."

"They took us to the high school, and I saw some weird stuff that night, just... I..."

"It's okay," Mary Ann reassured me, "you can tell us the details later."

"I got scared and I hid, in the theater." A crazy part of me wanted to tell her all of it. About peeing on the floor and the crazy church lady and cutting off fingertips with a metal hatch and pooping down below and I didn't. Jasper said I had to be careful. And Mary Ann looked like someone who'd be friends with the church lady zombie. Instinct also told me I shouldn't look vulnerable, though I knew that was impossible.

"I hid in there for days, all I had were pretzels and Gatorade. When I finally left, I saw a lot of zombies, all over. I screamed a few times, and more of them came when I screamed. So I ran, all the way out to the Marina and the lake." I couldn't tell the story of the zombie in the dinghy. It was too barbaric. I'd seem like a monster.

"An' that's where ole Jim saved the day," Jim added. "You're a right brave girl, Rita."

"So it is true about sound attracting them." Mary Ann looked over nervously at the line of guns. "Or at least we can confirm human sounds."

Jim followed her gaze, then shrugged. "Gotta kill 'em, Mary Ann."

She was still looking at the line of men with rifles. Some of them looked like pretty bad-ass military models. I hoped so. I didn't know anything about guns except you pointed them and pushed the trigger. Pulled. Whatever. Absentmindedly, Mary Ann said: "don't call them the z-word."

"What?" I was confused.

Mary Ann gave me her attention. "Don't call them zombies. Ain't right."

"Uh, okay." When she didn't answer right away, I finished the question. "Why not?"

"Radioman says it isn't right. Zombies are from bad movies, fiction. Makes _them_ seem less dangerous, makes you less careful."

"They're others, them, biters, whatever you want to call 'em that makes it serious," Jim helped out.

"The dead. The dead risen and walking again..." Mary Ann had a far away look in her eyes. She shuddered once, and fell silent.

"The walking dead. That works too." Jim stood up. "Come on, Rita. I know you don't want to see the boat or the lake again, but let's get around the island to my place. I can get you some dry clothes and you can really warm up."


	5. These Great and United States

On the way to his house, Jim told me that the phone system and the internet started getting spotty only the second day after the plane crash. Land lines worked for three days before cutting out. Now just about everything was completely down, except for power, though there were rumors people's cell phones worked for a few minutes yesterday.

By the time we got to his house, I found out it was eight days after the plane crash. I must have been passed out in that cubby for much longer stretches at a time than I thought. When I took a hot shower before putting on some borrowed clothes, I already looked skinnier than before. It seemed like a bad thing, even though I'd always thought I should be skinnier before. I was never overweight, but perfect always seemed to be smaller. Until now.

The power also went out as I showered, which I knew was a bad thing. Jim guessed it had something to do with the fire. He didn't seem too worried, though, suggesting we head back to the other side of the island in a few hours. Apparently this Steven who ran the island would have the radio going even if he had to hook a generator up to it. Jim went to work on something in the attic, telling me not to come up there, though he didn't say why. I took a nap on the couch instead. Covered in blankets for the first time in days, I slept deeply until Jim woke me up.

"Stay tuned for Lorena Lynd, President of these great and United States."

"Who?" I leaned over and questioned Jasper. We were both sitting at the edge of a crowd around the speakers set up outside the big house at the point of the island.

"The Attorney General. Er, former Attorney General."

"How does the General Attorney, whatever, become President?"

Jasper shrugged. "Enough people die, I guess. Three days ago it was the Secretary of State, that guy that ran for President and lost, uh, before your time. Last few days the government didn't even manage a broadcast."

"My fellow Americans," the Attorney General sounded like a strong and confident woman, so that was something. "These are not the End Times, no matter how much they look like our worst nightmares. As you know, we face multiple threats. The influenza that has clogged our hospitals. The secondary infection, with all its random violence and terrors. It is now known that even in cases where..." static filled the broadcast for awhile. "Yet these threats are manageable. This government, our government, can and will find answers. The true danger is panic. Panic, fear, and selfishness. We, as a people, are strong when we are united. We are weak when we turn our backs upon one another. We must help our neighbors. We must not stockpile. Official government envoys are performing vital work. Provide fuel and resources if they are needed to keep our response to this crisis moving forward.

"Forward, to a solution. The best scientists at MIT, Stanford, and other top colleges are working to halt this new strain of influenza. It is NOT a bird flu. You do not need to slaughter...." More static. "...peat, you do not need to slaughter fowl, save those for the dinner table." Complaints rose from the crowd, some calling out how many chickens they already killed. "...Center for Disease Control in Atlanta is working on a cure for the secondary infection, co-ordinating with the World Health Organization and other top research institutes. We continue to recommend that everyone avoid all contact with those who have the secondary infection, particularly their bodily fluids, including saliva. Possibly especially saliva. If you do encounter someone with the secondary infection, and I expect most of you have, it is recommended that you lock them in a confined place, if possible. If it is absolutely necessary, they can be killed by destroying the brain. We urge you to attempt to confine those with a secondary infection, or a bite from an infected individual. But if stronger action is necessary, it will be assumed to be self defense in all cases...." Most of the crowd seemed to stop listening after the advice to confine the walking dead, there was even some boos and angry muttering.

"Our hearts go out to Los Angeles, so badly hurt by the riots that helped spread the crisis through that city. Our help goes out as well. The Fortieth Infantry Division has already been deployed to return order to that city, and other military units will follow. All reservists and all former members of the military have been called to active service and I remind any members of the military to immediately report to the closest command post for orders.

"Civilians can expect the best support that our military can reasonably provide. But you must be warned that, for security, free fire 'clear' zones extending a few hundred yards have been set up around the command center at Ontario Airport, just like those around the CDC, the capital in Washington, D.C., Offutt Air Force Base in Nebraska, and other strategic installations..."

"FEMA is continuing to operate safe zones near Atlanta, New Orleans, Dallas, San Diego, Seattle, Salt Lake City, Chicago, Detroit, Saint Louis, Cinncinati, Philadelphia, Newark, and Boston. I regret to say that there is simply no way FEMA can provide a refuge for most of America. However, the Federal Emergency Management Agency has posted survival guides on its website," more boos from the crowd, "and instructions for purifying water and preserving food without a freezer will follow this broadcast. For those whom we cannot help, turn to our nation's greatest strength: our hospitality. We must rely upon one another. God bless you all, and God bless the United States of America."

After the end of the President's speech, most people started talking, and complaining. I tried to listen to the instructions about water and food, but failed. Jim, in front of me, was trashing the Attorney General to another man. "She's an abortionist, just like all them are. She says 'God Bless America'. She should be ashamed of herself. It's her and all the abortionists and Democrats that pissed God off." The other man was nodding in agreement, though he didn't really seem to be paying a lot of attention to Jim. I was transfixed. It was like watching a real-life, end-of-the-world Sasha Baron Cohen skit.

Jasper leaned over and whispered in my ear, real low. "Believe it or not, Jim's actually really smart when he's not batshit crazy." I had to stifle a laugh.

It took a few minutes after the water instructions for me to find out what everyone was really waiting for.

"HELLO AMERICANS! Yes, even you North Americans in Canada, I decided we love you guys too. This is The Last Radioman, here for all your end-of-the-world news. First of all, congratulations to our new President! May her reign last many days.

"Our fine overlords are actually telling some truth today. A little birdie told me that the military has already moved into Los Angeles in a big way. And it's a total shit-storm! Like other deployments, they're reporting body counts that keep going higher every time the generals can make up new numbers, but the people really in the know tell me that the good 'ole U.S. Army is already running out of bullets! Apparently the great military-industrial complex don't work so well when the industrial isn't part of it and our boys fire off half a clip on auto to take one of the growlers out and still don't hit the head!

But in all honesty, Los Angeles better hope the boys in the Fortieth are on the ball, because I have it on good authority that if they aren't, the living in L.A. are in for some REAL nastiness. No one's stupid enough to use nukes yet, thank God, and who knows what the hell the Russians are doing, but Queens, Harlem, and Jersey City are basically gone. My sympathies to those of you with loved ones in those cities, but it seems the government is dead serious about trying to protect Manhattan and all those important rich people. Carpet bombing, including napalm, has flattened everything north of Central Park, and everything else around Manhattan that isn't vitally important. We're talking mass murder, folks, and while I'm sure it killed six tons or more Rabids, day-am, that's some cold shit. If you live in any densely-packed city that isn't Manhattan, get the hell out. They're just killing en masse, now.

"What about an island, should we head there? Hell if I know, but don't got to Nantucket, the Florida Keyes, Puerto Rico, or anything else famous enough you've heard about it. San Juan is overrun by the dead, and residents on the other islands are using more of their precious ammo shooting newcomers flooding onto their island paradises with nothing more but the clothes on their backs than on the Biters.

"Yeah that's right, I said Biters. And Rabids. Or Roamers. Remember, don't call them that-word-we-don't-use! It's just asking to get sloppy. And you get sloppy, you get dead.

"And now what really matters: the weather. Yep, the weather. I've got access to satellites, and let me tell you, there's some messed up stuff out there. Rains are continuing to pound the Midwest, and they're not stopping anytime soon. With everyone at the Army Corps of Engineers dead or looking after their families, the Mississippi River Valley is in big trouble. If you live in a flood zone, get the hell out. I don't know where, I don't know when, but some major levies are going to blow before the rains pass!

"It's not just us in the Americas, either. The same satellites show Mosul Dam in Iraq finally went. Which means a bunch of ex-Muslim Geeks in Baghdad are about to test out just how well Rotters can swim. Not well, I'm guessing. But we'll see if they'll still nibble on you after being submerged for a few days. When in doubt, assume the worst.

"Now let's get down to the state of the state. Totally and absolutely screwed. It's been forever, by which I mean almost a week, since the government gave up on pushing everyone to get flu shots and realized we are in the End Times. No matter what the President-of-the-day says. Most of us died of the flu, most if not all of those came back, and we didn't kill 'em all. Shame on us. Make up for it by killing a Skin-eater or two. But most of all, remember you're on your own, folks. Make no mistake about that. You want to survive? Then start looking after you and yours. And don't forget yours. If you've got a loved one, keep a-lovin' them.

"Now that's enough of the general stuff. On to the regional news. Except remember to keep listening to The Last Radioman, since you got no choice with the internet being gone. I miss the internet already. I'd say why, but this is a family show.

"In British Columbia, which is just next to you folks in Seattle, Vancouver Island is no longer a safe haven. The Canadian army has attempted to cut off the city of Victoria from the rest of island by enacting shoot-to-kill zones along Highway One and Route 14. The navy is also destroying bridges and bombing critical road links in an attempt to keep the dead and apparently also the living from overwhelming farm towns now deemed "critical Commonwealth strategic resources". Hell, I'd congratulate the Canucks for acting quickly unless, you know, I was in Victoria or Vancouver and being cut off from any hope of survival..."

The crowd listened raptly, only occasionally nodding with a "good idea" or groaning at bad news, almost always following the the editorial slant of Radioman. He had a compelling cadence and voice, drawing in the listener. Who knew if he was making it all up, but the news was much more specific and at least seemed more useful than the government broadcast.

"Now for all y'all down in them Southern states, here's a big 'what the hell!?' for Pensacola. My best sources went dark after a street war broke out between two neighborhood protection bands. Now I've been telling you Pensacola has been doing better than most cities because of cooperation between the various groups. But apparently someone's taken some fishing boats from someone else, and lots of people modified their AR-15s to fire on full auto. Now one group thinks they'll be in good shape if they can hold the port and all the boats, while the rest of the city masses to take back the lost territory. There's a navy base next to the harbor, so I guess we'll find out just how many of our navy boys died and took piece out of their brother, because if the base is still working, it sounds like they'll be shooting up some folks just to cut down on the idiots out there.

"Atlanta is still broadcasting calls to join the refugee center setup around the airport. Which is just weird. I can't imagine they'll be able to feed however many thousands, tens-of-thousands, dare-I-hope-more, are still alive in the region. At least not for long. Stay alert, and stay cynical, Atlantans. Still, reports are that the flu has been less deadly thereabouts, possibly even killing only half or so of the population. That's a best guess from my source on the ground. Good news, more-or-less, but I'll take it. My source, by the way, is in the suburbs and NOT near the FEMA refugee center. No confirmation either way on conditions there. But in the more-good-news department, consistent but not frantic gunfire from around the CDC indicates the military cordon there is holding strong. Armored brigades have also entered the city. Tanks are BIG up close, aren't they Atlantans?"

"My military pals tell me the tanks came up from Fort Benning, which is still running boot camps and calling for volunteers. That's the word, we'll see how long it lasts.

"And now, I'm actually passing on some official government news, no joke, from Montgomery, capital of the fine state of Alabamey. One of the last living governors in the nation, the honorable Bert Straightly, has passed away, succumbing to the flu. Whatever it means, he lasted six days with flu symptoms, while most folks know one way or another in only one or two. He blew his own brains out, so his staff wouldn't have to. Hell of a guy, the guv."

The crowd continued listening intently, except for the men on watch, even for news about regions that weren't their own. I was drawn into Utah news, hearing that the Mormon church, headquartered in the state, appointed their fifth prophet since the crisis began, none of which had put out a statement explaining to their followers how to understand what was going on, but Radioman claimed a church militia continued to hold the walled Temple Square compound against 'the hordes of undead Salt Lake Citians'. I hoped it was true. I hoped my family was alive, but then I remembered the phone call I got after the plane crash. If they were freaked out before I knew what was going on, it wasn't a good sign. It hurt, thinking about them. I didn't know how to... I just didn't know. I guess that was the big problem.

By the end of the broadcast, I was wondering again how many people were listening to the government, or Radioman, or neither. And if either broadcast held much truth. In any case, more important issues were at hand. I went to each of the cooks preparing food for the Buffington Island people, and got a plate. Some of what they were offering looked pretty bad. But I ate it all. And hoped I didn't look greedy, since each cook only saw me once.

Jim must have been watching me though. "You putting it away, girl! Smart. Not the time to watch your waistline."

Jim was right. And I knew he was right, because I went through the cubby and not having enough food and losing weight recovering from the flu. Hunger made you weak. And when you were weak, your mind didn't always work so well. And you weren't safe from doing stupid things. Stupid things that could get you killed. But when I looked around at the people drifting off to their homes, I wasn't sure if they knew what Jim and I knew. About how important food was. And other, similar stuff. They seemed like they were living a regular life. Guys with guns. Women cooking like it was a barbecue. Sure, there was no TV or Internet. But people gathered around listening to the radio. It struck me as deeply wrong. It scared me. And I wasn't sure why.

Jasper came by about then, greeted me, and went to talk to Jim. "How about that wind."

"What wind, Jasper?"

Jasper nodded, as if that was the right answer. "Just a breeze, and pushing to the east. But you can still see the fire."

"Yeah, shifted a bit, but it's still goin'. Power went out at my place earlier. Thought it was the fire."

"Most like. You wanna stay at my place tonight, keep an eye on the weather? Better view on this side of the island."

Jim looked at the other man, nodding slowly. "Might do. What do you think, Rita? Take Jasper's floor instead of a room at my place?"

Yes! I didn't want to sleep in Jim's house tonight. "Okay."

"You should take the first go on the cot," Jasper told the other man. "I got a few things to put together that are here and there."

Jim nodded as if that made perfect sense. "I'm all squared away over at my place." Jasper nodded, looked over at Steven and the new shift of riflemen to make sure they hadn't been listening in, then showed me to a nice comfy floor.


	6. Easy Come, Easy Go

Jim came into the room and woke Jasper up three or four hours later. Even before he nudged me with his shoe, I was fully awake. Now that was weird. I hated getting up in the mornings. I always hit the snooze button at least five times, and I was notorious for being fuzzy in the morning. Not that night. I woke up, and a shot of adrenaline forced my brain to full speed, despite the lack of sleep.

"Wind turned. Y'all gonna wanna see this." Jim left the room, expecting us to follow him.

It was dark outside, only a few stars peeking through the clouds. Except for the orange glow from Cedar Bluff. After we turned around the corner of the house Jasper had a room in, we both stopped in our tracks. Cedar Bluff was a little over half a mile away, but the raging fire consuming the town made the smaller blaze earlier in the day look like a backyard campfire. Everything was burning, from one end of the town to the other. Only the tip connected to Buffington Island remained untouched. But I could feel a steady wind blowing into my face, and I knew it was only a matter of time before that little bit of Cedar Bluff was consumed by the fire.

As huge as the blaze was, Buffington Island should be safe. There was only a road and narrow line of trees on the neck of road leading from Cedar Bluff to the island. The fire was shadowed at its base, darker than it should be, the result of a stand of trees.

Steven didn't look worried. He strode towards us, tall and well-groomed. A full head of black hair catching in the wind. Wearing a big purple robe, of all things. I hadn't formally met the man yet, and he didn't seem interested in making my acquaintance tonight, either. He nodded at Jasper, but addressed Jim. "Quite the sight, isn't it."

"Yes it is."

"And to think they warned us the island was farther from fire fighting help when we bought out here." Steven threw back his head and laughed. I couldn't tell if he was brave, arrogant, foolish, or all three.

"As if we needed more proof realtors never know what they're talking about." Jim played along with the island's leader.

The orange glow of the fire played tricks with Steven's face as he gave us a big, toothy grin. "My brother-in-law's a realtor. And a damn fool. He bought his home right where all the services overlap in the center of town." And he was probably dead. That settled it, I sided with arrogant and foolish.

Though not entirely impractical. "Jasper, can I count on you to wake up a few people and gather whatever you can find in our garages that can hold water? We're going to want to fill some containers up from the lake and get ready to soak the trees on the side of the road where it connects to the island."

"Yessir. Soon as I finish taking it all in."

"A few minutes. We should still have a little time." Steven put his hand on Jasper's shoulder and shook it just a bit, in what was supposed to be a reassuring gesture, but just seemed condescending to me.

Steven went inside his giant house, presumably to wake a few more people up. The three of us just stood watching the fire come closer. When it reached the stand of trees previously keeping the base of the fire in shadow, it still looked wrong. The fire still didn't extend all the way from the ground up into the air. A shadow, shorter, shifting, was advancing in front of the glow of the blaze. A chill ran through me. It couldn't be.

Jim and Jasper tensed up at about the same time, and the riflemen, six of them at the moment, started getting agitated and lifted their guns. One ran to Steven's house yelling for them. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Dozens... a hundred... hundreds? I couldn't tell how many walkers coming for the island, driven towards us by the fire. They'd been hidden by the shadow thrown by the stand of trees, until those caught fire and illuminated it. One great mass of once-human bodies, like a grotesque mass-march of the dead.

They were frightening enough, scattered throughout Cedar Bluff, appearing from every corner and trying to eat you. This was something else. A force of nature, like watching flood waters rise and knowing you have no where to go when the levee breaks.

The riflemen started firing, and it didn't do anything. Even if they hit a few in the head, what did it matter? The great mass of walkers would still come for us. The wind started to die down even as I realized we really needed the fire to overtake the dead.

"Got all your things?" Jim whispered, as Steven ran out of his house to look at the threat.

"Yep. Though I think I'll do as the man says and look in the garage for something useful." Jasper made himself busy.

Steven reassured the riflemen and ran back towards us, clearly looking for resources to deal with the threat. "Jim. Need you to grab a weapon. We're gonna need all hands on deck."

Steven was already turning away when Jim countered. "My neighbor, Dan, pretty sure he had a whole stash of ammo. I could go get it real quick." Steven paused in indecision; Jim took the opportunity to press harder. "More guns don't help if you run out of bullets." The sharp crackle of gunfire was becoming almost constant now. Steven nodded and went to try to organize a defense.

"Come on, Rita." Jim took my hand and guided me towards his boat, tied up to one of the small docks behind Steven's big house.

Jasper met up with us a few moments after we settled into the motorboat, carrying a container of gasoline. "This is the last of what he's got."

Jim nodded, unconcerned, and started the motor. When he picked up some speed, and I was once again heading to Jim's house by boat, Jim felt free to speak. "I ain't gonna miss 'em. Pretentious bastard can get eaten defending his big house for all I care.

"I'd have said the same not long ago." Jasper looked thoughtful. "I don't know. He's a bastard, but I hope he makes it. I hope he defends that island and holds strong."

"Not enough bullets." Jim was pragmatic.

"No," Jasper took his time answering the other man. "Probably not."

It was about then I realized Jasper never even attempted to gather water in case the fire made it to Buffington Island. "Aren't we going to get more ammo?"

Jasper looked at me with curiosity, Jim just looked serious. "No, babe. Ain't no stash of ammo in my neighbor's basement. I already checked the house after Dan kicked it." Oh. I looked around the boat and saw a light coat, a backpack filled with food and hiking stuff, and a 24-pack of bottled water. The things Jasper had here-and-there, I guess.

At Jim's house we pulled several gallons of gasoline, some more food, three backpacks, and five guns out of the attic. Jim put a pistol in his bag, a revolver on his hip, and carried a nasty-looking black assault rifle.

"I'm going to need one of those, too." Jasper pointed at the pistol Jim was putting in his big hiking backpack, looking determined. He wasn't confident Jim would give up one of his guns.

"You can take the twenty-two, but I was hoping you'd take this instead." Jim handed the other rifle to Jasper, this one made of wood and dull black metal. "I like my AR-15 better, so I'm keeping that, but if you take the AK, we'll be able to use both kinds of ammo. They're both modded for full auto." Jasper nodded several times, feeling better with each nod, as he turned the rifle this way and that, confirming it worked the way he expected it to. Jim handed the smallest gun to me. "You know how to use guns, babe?"

"No." I shook my head for emphasis. I had never even held one before.

"This is a twenty-two. Won't knock a man down, but a headshot is a headshot, so you can use it against a biter in a pinch. NEVER point it at another person. This is the safety. Keep it down like this, and the gun can't shoot. Push it up, and you can shoot the gun by pulling the trigger. We'll go over the rest when we have more time."

It was heavier than I thought. I held the little gun carefully, worried it would go off, not sure what to do with it. Jim took my hand and pointed the gun at the ground. "Safest place to point a gun." To Jasper: "we'll handle magazines after we're on the water."

We loaded the new supplies in Jim's boat, after Jasper showed me how to tuck the gun into my pants if I needed to. It never would have worked if I still had my tight jeans, but at this point all I had was some old clothes that came from someone on the island. The previous owner was probably dead. But now my pants had enough room for a gun. If it didn't slip down while I walked, shooting me in the leg. Joy.

After we loaded the supplies we hurried into the boat, thoughtful looks at the glow on the horizon forgotten as someone from two houses down woke up and looked like he'd head our way. Jim got us going on the lake, heading out away from the island before angling south and then east. Apparently the plan was to pass under the causeway south of Cedar Bluff before going upstream along the Coosa River.

After rounded the southern point of Buffington Island, I tried to see how the fighting was going. It was hard to make anything out. Aside from the fire, it really was a dark night. There were some flashes I thought were gunfire, but I couldn't tell if they were at the tip of the island where Steven had kept the rifle line the whole time I was on the island, or farther back amidst the houses. They seemed hidden behind something, illuminating a few structures, but no people. Or former people. The three of us in the boat watched silently, each keeping to our own thoughts, wondering how many people on Buffington Island would survive the night. It felt wrong to leave them. I hadn't been part of the planning to do so; I wasn't even sure when Jim and Jasper agreed to leave if trouble began. But I didn't want to go back.

After we passed under the causeway, we had a view of almost all of Cedar Bluff. Looking northeast, it seemed like the entire horizon was one big wall of flame. It was surreal. Like I was watching the end of the world. It was strange to realize that the marina where I jumped into the lake to escape the walkers was part of that wall of fire. I thought for a second that everything would burn, that I'd witness everything that ever existed consumed by fire, and the boat would continue on until it fell right off the edge of the world, into nothing. I wondered for a moment if everything from the plane crash on had been a dream, or that I was dead, and imagining crazy things. But then I imagined a flight attendant being bitten before the crash, maybe before the flight, I saw the knife sticking out of the back of the undead church-lady before me, and then everything was crushingly, depressingly, real again.

Everyone I knew was dead. Or might as well be. I was alone, with no one but Jasper and Jim, and I didn't really know them. Something about Jim made me a little afraid of him, and all I could say for sure about Jasper was that he was willing to pull me out of lakes. Then again, they gave me a gun. That showed trust, right? I turned away from uncomfortable questions and let myself be captivated by the great fire. It was a real spectacle, and taking in that amazing, surreal view was a welcome distraction from worry and fear.


	7. Fried Bologna

We ended getting a few more hours of sleep after grounding ourselves on a sand bar south of some uninhabited island. We woke up at dawn, and decided on breakfast. Jim laid a small one-pan kerosene stove on the sand bar and knelt next to it to cook. He melted about half a stick of butter in the pan, then fried up three eggs and some slices of of a perfectly circular meat he called baloney. The package said bologna. It was oily, and heavy, and surprisingly good.

After we ate, Jim showed me how to use the metal bits on the top of my "twenty-two" to aim the gun. I pointed it at various trees across the river, trying to imagine actually firing it, while Jasper packed up what we used for breakfast and Jim checked over the boat's motor to make sure it was in good condition. As I was lining up the metal bits to pretend take out another tree, there was splashing in the water on the far side of the sandbank. I looked over to see what kind of monster fish was making that kind of noise only to see a wet, bloated head rise up out of the water. Jasper cried out, the boat lurched, there was a crashing noise and Jim cursed.

The dead thing struggled forward, climbing onto the sand bar on all fours, its body clearly not working well because of, well, water-logging, I guessed. Its grotesque face didn't look even remotely human, skin sagging down and paler than the eggshells from breakfast. An eye socket started out at me, empty and menacing. Other random bits were missing from its face, as if fish had eaten away at it. The dead thing jerked and lurched, standing up amidst a sickening wet squelching sound, only six feet away from me.

"Shoot it!" Jim woke me up. I lined the metal bits up with its head, which was moving too much, pulled the trigger, panicked, remembered the safety, flipped it off, pulled the trigger again, heard the loud report of the firing explosion, and saw the dead thing's left shoulder jerk back. It almost turned around with the impact, but came at me again. Appearing huge, the hungry walker was the only thing I could see. My vision processed nothing but the thing about to kill me. I fired again, pulling the trigger of a gun like a gambler throwing dice with everything on the line.

My arms were too far up from the gun's kickback and I didn't even come close to hitting the walker. I fired again, into the air, and my arms were almost pointed up. Then, the world shook. Three times. Pain exploded in my skull, and I fell to the ground with the walker, now missing most of its head. I held my ears and tried not to ventilate while swimming in pain, wondering if I was deaf. Only a few moments later, I just wanted the ringing to stop.

Jasper jumped out of the boat and into the water, pulling the boat back up on the sandbar. With the rifle that saved my life and caused me so much pain slung at his side, he knelt next to me. He said something I couldn't make out before picking me up and taking me over to the boat. Jim started up the motor, face grim, and took us away from the twice-dead corpse.

We took a course up the Coosa. None of us said anything for at least ten minutes. Jim piloted the boat expertly, taking us along a winding, confusing course, with lots of twists and turns and choices for which way to go. Eventually, Jasper busied himself re-securing our supplies in the boat, putting everything in its place. Except our trash, which Jim casually tossed overboard. Jasper and I were both shocked for a moment, but it's not like we could drop it off at a garbage can to be picked up later. Still seemed wrong.

Eventually Jasper noticed me rubbing my temples and produced some asprin, handing three tablets to me. "Thank you."

"Those things are loud enough when you're standing behind them. I hope I didn't damage your hearing."

"Well, I heard that." Jasper smiled at me.

"You gonna be okay, Rita?" Jim managed to look concerned, too.

"Yeah, but..."

"But what?" Jim pressed.

"That walker. It had a Delta uniform on."

"That walker was some fucked-up shit," Jim opined.

"One of the survivors? Driven by the fire into the lake?" Jasper tried to make sense of the sodden walker.

I shook my head no. "When I left the high school, I had to run out into to the lake to get away from the... things"

"Just call them biters," Jim interjected, "it's too hard to figure what word to use."

Seemed sensible. "When I ran into the lake, some of them tried to follow. They'd turn around when it got too deep, turn back for me, turn around again. Maybe some instinct still fears being underwater."

Jasper frowned. "So why'd this one come up from who knows how deep."

I shivered, wondering how deep the lake was. It took me awhile to whisper the answer. "None of the crew survived. All of the survivors were passengers."

"Oooh..." Jasper was at a loss for words.

"Motherfucking shit-dogs." Jim, eloquent as always. He worked through it: "man-stewardess belts in for the crash landing; dies when Delta flight two-fifty-whatever sinks into the lake. Turns. Then after NINE DAYS it gets loose, and fucking walks ashore. Mother!Fucker!"

Jim was not happy, already thinking about the implications for the future. "They fear deep water, but they don't drown. Nine days underwater, an' they just keep on ticking. World's not just fucked. It's fucked long-term. They ain't gonna waste away. Ain't gonna die off and let the rest of us put it all back together."

A few minutes later, Jasper came to his own conclusions and joined in with the swearing. "Shit. Guess upstream is as good as down. I wanted downstream, but this means the islands are no good. Not only is every living, breathing person going to be fighting over them, but even if we got one, you could never feel safe. You'd never know if biters were washed ashore during the night and are wandering around waiting for you." The last bit was plaintive: "I had my heart set on an island."

"Is that why we haven't seen anyone else?" That had been bothering me for awhile. "There were a lot of boats on Buffington. But no one else went past us. Is it because we're upstream?"

Jasper didn't want to guess at bad news. Jim just shrugged and answered: "don't know. Could be they fought off the horde. Killed 'em all an' are doin' the math again, how many people, how much food."

"You really think so?" There had been hundreds of biters.

"No. I think those that ran away first got into the boats and went downstream, for the coast. Rest died, or will soon." Jim was probably right. "But hell, maybe they had enough bullets, didn't miss the heads."

They were strangers to me, but I hoped they lived. Jasper had no love for them, but he looked like he hoped so, too. Jim pretty clearly didn't care.

We had another silence for awhile, the motor comfortably in the background, until Jasper got over his island dream. "We have a plan, then? Or should we be making one?"

A plan! That sounded nice. I hadn't had a plan since I decided to buy Gatorade and pretzels and hide in the theater. In retrospect, that plan worked out pretty well.

"Ain't nothing upstream but farms until Coosa." Jim explained. "An' Coosa's just a little nothing pit stop an' a power plan outsida Rome. "Figure we won't see nobody, alive or dead, up to then. We can get out before Coosa and hoof it, or try for a car at the power plant. Either way, just north is John's Mountain Wildlife Refuge. Not all that wild, lotta farms in it. But hills, too. Thereabouts, or maybe by the quarry, we can find a cabin tucked away somewheres.

"The quarry?" I perked up, suddenly excited for no good reason. "A friend of mine told me to look for a quarry from the plane, on the approach to Atlanta. She said it looked cool from the air."

Jim gave me a weird look. Why did I care about that? "Nah. That's Bellwood. Old quarry we're by is Rock Mountain. Lotsa old stone pits around here." I was disappointed, but that gave me the space to realize why I wanted it to be the Atlanta quarry. Jessica told me to look for the quarry from the plane before I lost my parents, tore out a biter's eyes, and everything went to shit. If I could see that quarry, it'd be like I was back before everything was horrible. But I couldn't go back, and I'd probably never see that quarry.

"Find a cabin, make it ours, ride out the storm for awhile." Jim got back to the plan. "Figure ham radio'll start up. A real network, not just 'help me, there's biters'. We can let others do the trial an' error, meet up with whoever seems smartest. Hell, we get real lucky, guvmint or Radioman'll come up with somethin' good." Jim paused. "'Course, yesterday I's thinking most the biters would waste away after a month or so. Now, I dunno. Don't think vultures'll eat dead flesh still movin'. An' if they don't need air, what else don't they need?"

Jasper nodded, reassuring Jim the plan was sound. "Wildlife refuge will have animals we can eat. Fresh food will keep us healthy. Layin' low sounds like a good idea, keeps us out of the way of the crazy coming before the living figures out what's what."

I wondered if my mother would approve of my new diet, what with the extenuating circumstances. All meat, all the time. Just like the biters.


	8. First Times

Jim was partially wrong. We eventually passed another boat heading downstream. Jim made no attempt to slow down or greet the other vessel. Jasper kept his rifle hidden below the rim of the boat, but stayed ready to suddenly raise the gun and start shooting.

The other boat was a little nicer than ours, and it looked like it carried a family. A mother and two teenage boys, all with perfect mocha skin. Except the woman was too young to be the mother of two teenage boys. Maybe they were a family, just without the parents. A pain struck my heart, as I was suddenly sorry for them. And for me. I missed my family, while the one across the river drifted by, no more interested in trying to meet up with us than Jim was with meeting with them. 

We continued traveling against the current for most of the day, the boat's motor emitting a continuous low drone. Jim wasn't bothering to push it hard. In the afternoon, after lunch, we'd been traveling in silence for almost an hour when out of the blue Jim asked: "what happened, first time you saw one?"

Jasper and I looked at Jim, and then at each other, surprised at the question and unsure who Jim was addressing.

"Both of you, either, whatever."

It wasn't a fun topic. Neither Jasper nor I was eager to share.

"Fine. I'll start. It was the third night after the plane crash." That would be the second night I spent hiding in the cubby. After I peed on the floor, but before I cut off the crazy church lady's fingertips with the trap door. It almost seemed very late for Jim to have seen one of the dead, since I was pretty sure that two days before he saw one, I narrowly escaped the gym and some undead crash survivors.

"For two days I'd skipped work. Because of the flu, of course. But it didn't hit me hard. Probably not because I had my shot this year, but whatever. I'll take the luck. I spent most of the time in bed or on the flight simulator. I wasn't watching the news." Jim shook his head and breathed out to express how weird it all was. "I still knew something was off. My boss never called me to try and get me to work at home, catch up on some of the slack. And my next door neighbor, Lou Jean, came over to gossip and asked me if I was out on the lake rescuing the crash survivors, if any of you had been sick or weird. I told her I was working, and she told me you were over at the high school.

"Well now, that was double weird. First, you were in a plane crash! You don't stick someone like that in a gym like a flood victim. You get them to a god damn hospital, with helicopters or whatever if you have to. I guess there were some TV crews that showed up, so that was pretty normal. But I wondered why not at least send you to Cherokee Medical?"

"They called my phone out on the boat, policeman who was coordinating the pickup," Jasper interjected. "Said it was full. I told 'em they could make room. Policeman said they wouldn't even let people in the door, but wouldn't say why. Just that a lot of people were sick. I can't imagine he knew about dead walking and didn't talk, but maybe it's when the flu first start spreading around here."

"Could be. I assumed it came in on the plane." I shot Jim a dirty look, and he shrugged as if to say sorry. "Guess I was wrong. But you had crash victims in the school gym and Jean coming around, really wanting to know if y'all had been weird or sick. She's a bit of a gossip, but then she just left. As in, she didn't get any information from me, so now she's going to hit up someone else. Usually if she's gossipping she sticks around."

"I got this weird feeling, and called a friend of mine who's a prepper."

"A preppie?" I was confused.

"Disaster preparer. Scared guys that think they're tough, always ready for the end of the world. Like nuclear war and stuff. Well I didn't get through. So I called his wife, who asked if I was all right. Then before I could say anything, I hear my friend yell at her, he comes on the phone and tells me not to try and follow him, and hangs up.

"I still didn't know we were totally FUBAR. It could have been something minor and that guy might still have gone off the deep end. I turned on the TV, got the Emergency Broadcast System. Which was a hell of a lot less useful than some guy on CNN pretendin' he knew what was going on. So I went over to my other neighbor, who's a prick and a Democrat, but always acts like he knows everything." What's wrong with being a Democrat? It's not like they're Republicans.

"Anyway, I had all that warning. All that information saying 'watch your back,' and I still almost died. I knocked on Dan's door, and he didn't answer, so I pounded on it hard. He finally answered, saw it was me, and said 'Oh. Can I help you?' in that totally asshole way pencil-necks have when they're trying to tell you to get the fuck out. I was just telling him not to be an asshole, that I just had a few questions for him, when I saw his wife.

"She was at the kitchen table in their dining room, tied to a chair. And by tied, I mean an electrical cord from a vacuum around her legs, with the vacuum nearby. Then electrical tape and duct tape around her wrists in a big ball, and that was connected to the chair some way. Totally amateur.

"Anyway, I like Rosalyn." Jim paused for a moment to ease the boat around nothing, then pointed out the snout of an alligator barely poking above the water. At least I think that's what it was. I wasn't sure. "I liked Rosalyn, so I shoved Dan into the door, stepped into the house, and hit him in the gut for good measure. Little bitch folded, and I went to go be the hero. Even now, I'd swear up, down, and sideways that she was crying for help through duct tape over her mouth, struggling to get my attention or free herself.

"It's fucked up. I couldn't see it. Undead whore is trying to tear my throat out, and I'm yelling 'what the fuck did you do to her?' and pulling out my pocket knife to get her free. She kept squirming when I held her head and told her this was going to hurt. I ripped off the tape covering her mouth, and she lunged for me." Jim shook his head, recalling the scene, while Jasper and I, riveted by his story, waited to hear what came next.'

"Little bitch finally found his nutsack; ended up saved my life. Full-body tackle, and I never saw it coming. He dropped me good, crashing on top of me, and I cut myself with my pocket knife while Rosalyn went nuts, trying to snap at us, and only now do I think she's acting crazy.

"Well she managed to jerk on the cord connected to the vacuum, and it fell over and made a big crash, and I didn't see little bitch get off me. He did the smart thing, asshole, and kicked me hard, right in the balls. So I'm laying there, cupping my jewels, bleeding on them from my cut hand, while undead Rosalyn keeps jerking her chair, about to fall on me and kill me. Then Dan gets back from the kitchen, carrying a butcher knife at his side, and he's bled on it, so he fucking points it at me an' it's dripping blood, and I think I'm gonna die. He's gonna straight-up axe murder me.

"But he just asked me what the fuck I was doing. And she's still trying to get at one of us, either of us, while tied to that chair. So I asked him what's wrong with her. He puts the knife on the table, says he doesn't know, and breaks down crying. I got up, balls killing me, and put my arm around the guy. No fucking homo." Jim shoots Jasper a dirty look Jasper totally didn't deserve, and I get another now-common surreal feeling, like the world can't possibly be this way. Jim is telling this crazy, incredible story that I know is actually real life, and then he says no homo, and I'm thinking, 'holy shit, there's rednecks that actually say that,' and that thought does NOT fit everything else that's going on with this crazy story on river in Alabama. I want to laugh, or go crazy, or fall out of the boat, or DO SOMETHING. But I just sit there trying not to go insane. Because alligators.

"I stayed with him all night, and saw him get the fever. And this is nothing like the flu most everyone got. It ripped through him, worse than any fever I've ever seen. He's delirious, and sweating more water than a man should have in him, and sometimes he passes out, but it doesn't last. The blood on his arm, see, that got on the knife, that was from a bite. Multiple bites Rosalyn gave him. She attacked him, that's why he had to tie her up. So I saw my first biter. And my first bitten. He turned out to be a fighter. Lasted twelve hours. I already had him tied up a few hours into it, of course. I didn't know what was going on, but even if he was just ordinary delirious, I didn't want him kicking me in the balls again. Asshole.

"Saw him turn. Into one of them. Saw the fever go away, and his mind not come back. I left them both in that house. Didn't come back until three days later, with Steven and a couple of guys, and they were still snapping at us, didn't pee or die of thirst, and we killed them."

Everyone was silent for a minute. Then Jim shook his head, as if to clear his mind from the story. "I ain't dumb. I knew somethin' was wrong. An' the biter was already tied up, mouth covered with duct tape. An' I still almost got bit. Almost died. How many people are going to be left out there, when they're gonna run into biters for the first time without all that goin' for 'em?"

We sat in silence for a few minutes, the motor sounding louder and louder because it was the only thing making noise.

"Almost ashamed to say it after that, but I saw it all on TV." Jasper spread his hands, as if to say it really was true. "I went home after picking up Rita on the lake during the crash." It was him both times. I hadn't been sure. "Ate dinner with my girlfriend. We had a good night. An' I went to work the next day. A couple of people called in sick, but mostly I was selling lots of bait and tackle and a bit more bottled water than usual. One guy came in and told me I HAD to see what was on the news. But he didn't say 'a plane crashed into the World Trade Center' like on 9/11. He just said I should see what was on the news. I don't have a TV in the shop, uh, didn't have a TV in the shop, so I just ignored him.

"Got home and my girl is there with my sister and they are freaking out. Asked me where I've been. Work, where else. Going nuts, and hitting me for not answering my phone, which I forgot to charge. They were going on and on about this monster flu epidemic. They both work at the CVS, in the pharmacy. And word came down from on high. The feds called. Which has apparently never happened in history, ever. Or maybe the feds called corporate. But either way Shauna tells me they were instructed to immediately give out flu vaccines to anyone who wants one, for free. And they were supposed to call some number every hour and update their inventory. Seriously, on an hourly basis. I guess they ran out that day, because Shauna got all sneaky and told me she put one aside for me to make sure I got one. And the next thing you know, my sister swabs my arm without asking and Shauna sticks me with a needle. They know I hate needles and never get the the flu vaccine.

"So for like an hour, while I'm getting told by the pizza joint they aren't delivering, the girls are telling me about transmission vectors and infection rates and antibodies and all that. I started cooking lasagna and when it's about done I hear this big gasp from the living room, and Shauna actually yells out 'Oh, no, they didn't!' So I went over to check out what they're talking about and we see the emergency broadcast thing plastered all over the screen giving us some phone numbers and an address in Atlanta next to the FEMA logo.

"Both of them start talking a mile a minute, workin' out what's going on or trying to tell me what I missed while I was cooking, so I just picked up the remote and started flipping channels. Most of them were doing what they were supposed to, 'this is a real emergency. This is NOT a drill. Please record the following information about disaster support in your area. This has been a message from the emergency broadcast system. This is real emergency...'" Jasper's imitation of the emergency broadcast voice was surprisingly good.

"I found two channels that were working. One of the home shopping channels and the international channel, which basically just shows the BBC. I don't know if it's because they're foreign channels or whatever, but the first thing we see is a rebroadcast of an Al Jazeera anchor announcing that Iraq, Lebanon, and I think the UEA or something have closed their borders, and are apparently the last countries in the Middle East to do so, except Yemen for some reason. And Iran has openly threatened to shoot anyone trying to come ashore from Saudi Arabia.

"So whatever, it's just Middle East shit, but the anchor is British, and he looks SCARED. Then it cuts back to the BBC, and the woman in London starts talking about deranged people killing bystanders and someone supporting the Saudi troops in Yemen, or something, and I still don't get it. But then the woman from the BBC says we hope the guy with Al Jazeera will be all right, and they've promised to continue updates for as long as possible, despite several deaths in the studio.

"So that's when I got the what the fuck feeling. Where you know something is seriously off. Everything else up to then had been weird. I mean really weird, seeing that plane sticking out of the lake broken in two most of all. But, you know, I could handle it. I could understand it. When they said people were dead in that guy's studio, I'm thinking what the hell is going on. It's a news studio for a world-wide broadcaster. What's going on that people are dead in the studio, and it's NOT a war?

"Just when we started asking each other what it all meant, the BBC woman says they have video live from Trafalgar Square. And this video camera is sweeping over a whole bunch of people. Not packed, like a concert, just a lot of people. And they're all running, just running away from where the camera is sweeping to. And for a moment, there's nothing, nothing seems to be chasing them. Until finally there's some people half walking, half jogging after them, and some others bending over and doing who the hell knows with who the hell knows what.

"The anchor stops the voice over of what we can all see and just swears. 'Oh bloody hell,' or something. And it is bloody. It's four men in suits on the steps of this huge government building, columns above them, and they're just ripping the entrails out of a dead woman, gore everywhere. And they're eating her. Eating this woman they just killed in the middle of London.

"It was just on TV, but it was still one of the worst things I'd ever seen. Even without anything to smell, I went to the kitchen and threw up a little in the sink. When I came back, the woman was still on screen, but the camera had shifted a bit and you could see the body of a toddler on the ground, missing bits, next to her. Probably the kids' mother.

"They switched back to the studio then, and the anchor was telling us this was all real, and not just in Trafalgar Square, but all over London. A lot of what they read after that was official government statements, from the British government. But hell, at least it was something. The Emergency Broadcast System just wanted us to know about the FEMA camp in Atlanta. I still wonder if the president was already sick or if we just missed a speech.

"We stayed up late that night, watching the BBC come to terms with 'enraged persons' destroying their nation. Especially watching British soldiers with high caliber guns shoot these things over and over again, turning their bodies into rags. And they just kept coming, nothing stopped them except for a headshot. Eventually we went to sleep, after making plans to figure out if we were going to Atlanta in the morning.

"We never got the chance. The flu hit, hard. Vaccine didn't do shit. Apparently flu shots are like that some years, great in other years. I could see my neighbors piling things in their car when I got up to pee, but I could barely stand. For three days I drifted in and out of consciousness. Sometimes my sister was there to give me some water, put a rag on my forehead. Maybe she was taking care of Shauna too, I don't know. That's how out of it I was. It wasn't a I-feel-like-shit flu. I was half delirious in the rare instances I was conscious.

"I barely broke out of it in time. Sarah, my sister, had literally crawled into my room on her hands and knees and woke me up by pulling on my arm from the floor. She whispered that I had to get up, had to help her. Whispered because she couldn't manage anything louder. Once I realized she was begging for help from the floor because she couldn't stand, I got a surge of energy and sat up ready to do anything.

"But I just fell back on the bed. My head was just empty. Nothing worked, I was so sick. Finally, slowly, I sat back up. Stood up, got my bearings, found my phone, and called nine one one. It rang and rang and rang. No busy signal. Just no answer. No one from the police or the medical center either. You'd think I'd be all 'oh, shit!', but I was just mad. Wasn't thinking right. Yeah, England was all messed up; I didn't realize my home town would be just as bad.

"I knew I needed to get help, and I knew I couldn't do it alone. My neighbors were good for nothing shits, so I went to get Shauna to..." Jim broke down, crying, hunched over. I went and put my arm around his big shoulders. But it didn't help. After awhile, he continued, voice thick with grief. "She was dead. Just laying there in the bed, still wet from the fever sweat. Peaceful, mostly, but dead. I checked her pulse. Nothing. Breath, nothing. I fell down, just sat there on the floor. But not long. Shauna..." Jim broke off again.

"My sister was still alive. I got Sarah up, and together we barely made it to my car. I put her in the back seat, and got my rifle, put it in the front seat. Pulled out of the driveway, turned the car around, and saw one almost immediately. In the middle of the street, about two houses down, heading towards me in that sneaky-fast walk of theirs. I drove around it, thinking at first it was a tweaker or something. But it hit the side of the car when I was going twenty miles an hour. I looked in the rear view mirror and it was still staring at me. There were a lot. A few each block. That's when I had my second 'oh, shit' moment. They're everywhere, all over the place. Not just a bunch of them here, a bunch of them there, they're all through the town. But I'm in a car, I can drive around them. I go past the marina, see people getting in boats, fighting with some of them, it's chaos.

"On the causeway over to Centre, there's this over-turned truck and two biters blocking the open lane. I could have run them over, I guess. But... I don't know. I hadn't killed one yet. Didn't seem right." Jim furrowed his brow, as if he was holding his tongue about Jasper being an idiot.

"I know what's up now, okay? I hadn't killed one. Hadn't seen them kill. You don't get it right away. That's why they're so dangerous the first time. I had the TV before the flu, and was in the car, so I lived. Anyway. I turned around on the causeway, went past the marina again. Looked down Spring Street, didn't see any of them. Pure luck. My boss lives out on Buffington. I figure what the hell, I'll try there.

"I'm only a little way down Money Road, on the neck that connects Buffington Island to the mainland, when I see Steven and two guys standing in the middle of it. I slow down, get ready to turn around, when I see they have guns. Steven waves me over, and I was so relieved, man. Just so happy to see someone else who's alive. I drove up, and they gave me some shit about the rifle, took it from me. But Steven promised to set me up with a nurse married to some rich guy living on the island, have her look after Sarah for me.

"She died a day later. They were gonna drag her outside right then and there, Jack even had a sledgehammer with him already, but I wouldn't let her. Didn't believe it could happen to my sister. We tied her up, and it didn't take long. She turned. She turned, and I knew it wasn't no 'secondary infection'. She was dead. And she rose up again. Sarah rose up again, and it dawned on me that Shauna was wandering around my house, mindless. Still is, maybe.

"Steven's wife shot her. Shot Sarah. I don't blame her. I blame Steven. The motherfucker didn't even have the courtesy to let me do it myself." Jasper had no anger in his voice, just a quiet matter-of-fact hate. He looked down at his hands, and Jim and I realized he was done.

We gave Jasper a few minutes. All three of us sat there, motor puttering away, taking in everything that had been said. That sucked. Nothing good came of that. And eventually they both looked at me.

"My turn?" Jim nodded.

I took a big breath, let it out slowly, and told them my story. "One of them got the pilots on the plane, that's why it crashed. Which doesn't make any sense. It was a flight attendant, got into the cockpit, I guess they opened the security door for her, and she attacked them. There was this guy from a funeral home on the flight too, acting all creepy. The FAA guy thought that was important, I don't know."

A chill went through me, and I fought to control myself. My next words came out in a whisper, "I don't know. Can someone just turn? No reason, just become one of them?" Jasper and Jim did not look happy. They were shaking their heads no, as if they knew better. Liars.

"It doesn't make any sense. Creepy funeral home guy doesn't mean flight attendants suddenly turn into zombies." They both flinched. That word really hurt some people. "Biters. Sorry. And there was the one we saw this morning. Did he get bit? Did he get the flu before boarding the plane? How did that happen?" They didn't have any more answers than I did.

"Anyway, we didn't know about any of that. We crashed, everything was crazy, and there were about fifteen of us okay enough to stick us in the school gym. No big government response, just one FAA guy who interviewed us."

Jasper nodded. "Yeah. When we went out to the boats, trying not to wonder how many people died in the crash, we argued about what hotel would get vouchers from the airline. We were really wondering what hospital. But nothing."

"The survivors started getting really tense and angry in the morning. One guy got a taxi to come out and drive him all the way to Mobile. Most everyone else was on the phone with their parents. I couldn't get through to mine, and had a really weird conversation the day before, right after the crash. I wonder if it actually went bad in Salt Lake City earlier than here." It was my turn to cry for a bit, and have Jasper put his arm around me. But I didn't want his comfort. I wanted Dad. I wanted Mom to hug me.

"I got sick that night. Thought it was food poisoning. Bought some food and drink for an upset stomach. When I got back, one lady went crazy in the gym, everyone else was asleep. I think she was one of them. Turned. From the fever, but real fast maybe. She probably would have killed me, but she fell over another survivor's cot.

I said out loud what I didn't want to admit to myself earlier. "Probably killed them instead, saving my life. I don't know. I left the gym, hid in the theater.

"I had it bad, my mind was all messed up. I ended up hiding in a lighting booth thing and hallucinating. I think. I was there a long time. I'm not sure what was real and what wasn't, it was so bad. Except I saw one of them for the first time. Well, the first time I realized they weren't... uh..." I didn't know how to put it. "Weren't human, I guess. One of them was in the theater, and THAT was totally real. We saw each other, and I thought she was there to help. There was blood, but..."

I started breathing faster, scared all over again. Jasper sitting next to me helped. I got quiet again. "I'd have walked right up to her, let myself be eaten. But someone stabbed her already. There was a knife sticking out of her. Just sticking out of her. And she didn't care. I tried to hide in the lighting space, but she came after me, wouldn't go away. She almost got in, but I closed the door on her." I gulped. "I broke her hand. Cut its fingertips right off. And it didn't care."

"She went away after, like, hours. And I stayed up there for days and days, until I ran out of food." I looked over at Jim. "You're right. We're the lucky ones. Two people had to die so I could live. The survivor in the gym, who probably got eaten. And the one who stabbed the thing in the theater. If they don't die first, I don't make it. Even after I left, escaped the high school, I saw one of the other survivors through a window. I went to help her, but she was one of them. If it hadn't been in the school while I was outside, I probably would have died."

Jim looked grim. "Most people aren't going to be as lucky as us. I don't know how many people the flu killed, but dollars to doughnuts most people are dead."

Jasper looked wistful, and a little scared. "Most people in Cedar Bluff, yeah. Most Americans?"

"No." Jim's tone was not comforting. "Most people. Everywhere. In the whole world."

I had two thoughts. One was just sadness. The other was a sinking certainty Jim was right.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope any readers find my beginning-of-the-end-of-the-world scenario interesting. As usual with my writing, it's more detailed and lengthy than initially planned. I'm also at the point where any future updates will be extremely irregular, and probably extremely infrequent. I have a few future chapters written, and a multi-year story arc, but this is fan-fiction, so only worked on when I have the time and the inclination. Let me know what you think so far by leaving a comment! (Critical comments are actually appreciated more than fawning ones, though I like those too. Don't be shy!)


	9. Back On The Road Again

The day wore on, and Jim's boat continued to slowly putter upstream. Until he idled the motor as we approached a bend in the river. "Decision point, folks. Not far past that bend is Coosa, an' the power plant. An' right up there at that little dock is Old River Road, which branches off Route one hundred at the Narrows.

"We hafta decide if we're gonna get off at that dock and hike up into the Narrows, or at least the hills that make the road narrow. Those hills connect all the way up to John's Mountain refuge, which is about as far away as we can get from biters around here."

I raised my hand. "Uh, how do we know there aren't biters there?"

Jim shrugged. "We don't. Probly a few. But it's far away from the big towns. An' it's people that turn into biters. Seems like our best option for solitude."

"Except for people like us, heading into the hills for safety," Jasper pointed out.

"'Cept that," Jim agreed. "So we can hoof it, but that'd take a little while. Maybe a few days before we found a good spot. Or, we can go up to the power plant and get a vehicle. Power plant's remote, won't be hard to get to. But it seems like a place people might've tried to keep open. Maybe even go to work if they're sick. Could be biters. Should be trucks, though."

"Grab one of them, get up into the hills quick, and we don't have to risk a night in the woods?" Jasper asked.

"That's what I'm thinkin'. Plus, we can bring more of our stuff."

"I say we go for the truck," Jasper voted.

I nodded my head yes when they looked at me. "What about tonight? It's not that late, but we used up most up the day already."

Jim snapped his fingers and pointed at me, as if I'd gotten the right answer. "That's why I've been going so slow up the river. Figured we'd want to start tomorrow. We spend the night near the boat, and we have an easy way to escape if biters come up on us. Then we get going bright and early in the morning. I can put 'er up on the bank between those trees," Jim pointed to the east bank. "Nothin' but farm behind that, so other than the treeline, should have good vision. An' we'll hear a biter comin' through the trees. Figure Jasper and I'll each take watches. We stop now, an' we'll both get a good night's sleep."

Jasper looked at me, as if wondering if I should take a watch too, before agreeing with Jim's plan. "Sounds good. But I don't like to break up my sleep. Don't get as rested. Two eight-hour shifts." I thought that maybe I should be insulted they didn't trust me to guard them, but I was just happy I wasn't going to have to be on watch.

"You gonna stay ready for eight hours straight?" Jim questioned Jasper, looking doubtful.

Jasper nodded. "I whittle. Keeps the mind fresh."

With everything settled, Jim ran the boat ashore, then got out and pulled it up. He explained he wasn't going to tie the boat up, so that we wouldn't have to untie it if biters came. As long as the person on watch paid attention, it wouldn't drift back into the river. I got out and stretched, only half paying attention to Jim's explanation. It felt really good to get out of the boat after feeling trapped in it for so long. Even so, I didn't go far. Just to the edge of a field of crops. Wheat, according to Jasper. The plants were only about a foot high, not ready for harvest. And that's pretty much all I could see. A field of wheat in front of me, ringed by trees for the most part. It looked like there was some flat land, maybe a dirt track and some water or marsh on the far side of the field. Overall, it was a secluded, peaceful little world with nice, defined borders. And no biters. It felt cozy, but open. And safe. But I still didn't go far from the boat.

"Rita, come on over here." Jim called me back to the treeline, where Jasper was setting up the cooking gear and pulling out the ground beef left over from hamburgers at lunch. The ice in the cooler he stored it in was melted, but Jasper sniffed the meat and I guess it was still good. "Show us your kitchen skills. We don't want to eat male cooking forever."

Jim's orders made me uncomfortable for a few reasons, mostly because I didn't want to seem useless. "I, uh, I don't know how to cook meat. My family was vegetarian." Japser looked surprised. Jim looked like he pitied me.

"I'll show you how to make burgers." Jasper offered. "We probably won't have them again for awhile. But we have to use up the food that can go bad now, and I can give you some general meat pointers while we cook."

As it turns out, making hamburger patties from ground beef that's getting old is really slimy and gross. But we had burgers for the second time that day, with plenty of seconds since we were using up all the meat. That worked out pretty well.

"Kept the meat in Mary Ann's own garage freezer," Jasper explained as we were eating. "She had me as part of the crew keeping inventory of what we all had, and moving food this way and that to keep it organized. Take a pound off the tally here, put this in a freezer no one takes food out of unless it comes off the reserve inventory list, and voila, ground beef no one dares touch except me."

Jim chuckled, amused. "Y'all are sly when you need to be."

After dinner we put everything away in the boat, and Jasper laid down on the boat's floor with a coat over his eyes. The idea was that Jasper would take the first eight hours of sleep, Jim would replace him during the night. And I could sleep above either of them on the bench that wrapped around the bow of the boat. I got the only real cushion because I was small enough to lay on the bench without falling off.

Jim and I watched the sun go down, occasionally getting up to look out across the field, or make sure wind rustling leaves wasn't something else. Jim seemed alright with the fact I didn't want to talk much. He talked; for the most part he told dumb stories from when he was a teenager. I also learned he was an only child, and already lost his parents a few years ago. Which meant he hadn't really lost family to everything that had happened. I was a little jealous.

When it got dark, I used that as an excuse to go lay down in the boat and look up at the stars. There weren't many, since clouds covered most of the sky. But the ones I could see were pretty. And talking to Jim seemed to exhaust me for some reason. The stars were easy and peaceful.

I pretended to sleep for hours, though I dozed off before being woken up when Jasper went to take watch and Jim replaced him on the floor of the boat. I woke up a few more times after that, going back to sleep each time. Until I woke up for good shortly after dawn, to the shark crack of Jasper's rifle.

I immediately scanned the water and trees for walkers, while thinking that gunshots are a lot quieter when the barrel isn't pointed at you. I didn't think to go for my gun, but Jim got his rifle. He almost shot Jasper when the dark man came out of the trees. Jim jerked his gun up and to the right, away from Jasper, who stopped, frightened. "Jesus," was all Jim said, as he let out a huge breath and let the adrenaline pass.

"Damn near ended you."

"They ain't that fast," Jasper said, still looking spooked. He tried to hide his fear, but failed. "We need to make time to be extra sure they're biters before firing."

Jim nodded. "You take another one down?"

Jasper shook his head no. "She was coming across the field. Came at me when I waved, but didn't wave back. Had a chunk missing from her neck, so I took the shot. Missed her head, but knocked her down. Figured it was better to leave than go finish her off."

"Push us off, and we'll go." Jim got in the back of the boat to redistribute the weight, while Japser pushed hard, dislodging the boat and getting it back in the water. He jumped in when we were clear of the shore.

Jim started up the engine. "Might as well get a move on. Next stop, the power plant."

"Um," I spoke up, concerned with morning matters. "I need to pee."

Jim grunted. "Guess that is priority number one." He took us over to the little dock on the other side of the river. Jim and Jasper took turns keeping watch while the other pooped. I relieved myself too, feeling horribly messy and exposed. Both men were only a few feet away, though I did have one tree between me and them. But we could all smell each other's leavings. Bad as it was, none of us was embarrassed enough to get far from someone ready to protect us if a biter came up in the middle if it. At least we had toilet paper. I was trying to ignore the fact that I had greasy hair and still smelled of yesterday's sweat. The river was right next to us, but it was still chilly enough we didn't want to get in it. Add in the fact it didn't look too clean and we'd all seen what biters look like after being underwater for awhile, and none of us had suggested baths.

After we started moving again, Jim told me to get my gun and keep it on me. We were only a few minutes from the power plant. I started getting nervous almost right away, worried I'd have to use the gun. Worried I'd miss again.

A few minutes of worry passed and we could see an overpass crossing the river ahead of us, and a big giant grass ziggurat to our left. It looked strange, this hillside made of giant terraces, covered in grass. "What is that?"

"Old slag pile," Jasper explained. "All the trash and used up coal crap, and whatever junk the power plant puts out, they pile it all up there. Then when the wind picks up, it makes everyone nearby miserable. Eventually they truck in some dirt and lay some sod, keep it from giving everyone cancer."

How nice.

After we passed below the overpass, I could see the top another hill over the trees along the river. Not green; black. "Is that?"

"One big pile 'o coal."

"Wow."

A bunch of power lines crossed the river in the distance, but before we got to them Jim turned the boat to our left and put us on the shore. We got out of the boat, all of us holding our guns, and found silence. Nothing moving to alert us. Jim and I kept watch while Jasper tied the boat to a tree.

We had to climb about three feet up rise and almost immediately we were out of the trees and on the shoulder of a cement road that. To the left the road went under the overpass, presumably to the slag pile. To the right it led joined a network of tracks going through the mess of the coal yard. In front of us was a bunch of ugly. What looked like the pitiful remains of another big coal hill, little piles of black stuff sitting on a bed of grey, sickly looking muck. The grey muck became the shoreline of the yuckiest looking pond I'd ever seen. Grey-blue, like if you drank the water it'd kill you immediately. The largest yellow backhoe I'd ever seen sat on a road crossing through the old coal yard, looking oddly useful amongst a big pile of trash.

To the right, past what I guessed was the new slag heap, was a train. Filled coal car after filled coal car snaked around the big black hill of coal, heading into a building with a conveyor belt that went all the way up to the top of the coal hill. The trains must come in, get unloaded in the building, and the conveyor belt piles the black stuff up into a hill big enough that it had roads up its side. Giant dump trucks were parked on the road. Beyond the hill of coal I could make out the tops of some buildings and a big smoke stack. The power plant itself, I guessed. It was several football fields away. Nothing I could see was moving. It felt bad, like everything was dead when it should be lively. Really though, it was good. No biters I could see.

"Come on." Jim led us to the right, along the concrete road. We were headed in the direction of the train and the hill of coal, ugly slag on our left, trees and river on our right. There were a few piles of metal bars and wood along the tree line, and Jim was leading us towards a small temporary-looking building, maybe a construction office that was near the river and closer to us than the train and the hill of coal.

"Looks like a place you ought to find some pickups," Jasper said. He wasn't whispering, but he wasn't speaking at full volume either.

"'Cept at night, or during a disaster," Jim pointed out.

"Power plants run at night. Or during disasters." It didn't seem that simple to me.

"The plant does, but not whatever dinky stuff they were doing here," Jim explained.

We passed the construction office, keeping an eye out for biters hiding along the side of the building.   
Jasper walked up to the train where it curved around the coal hill, peering through the gap between the train cars. I tensed up. He even didn't check to see if there was a biter laying under the train cars before looking through them! I could almost feel how exposed his vulnerable feet were. But nothing happened, except Jasper reporting that he could see a parking lot and some cars. The parking lot was blocked by the train, useless to us.

Turning with the road, we put the river to our backs and headed north, between the slag and the hill of coal. The air smelled bad. I didn't know what exactly it smelled like. Almost like car exhaust. Duh. This was probably what coal dust smelled like. I kept to the left, closer to the slag, keeping away from the train and its many places to hide. I still remembered running through Cedar Bluff, with biters appearing from behind cars and any other place you might not think to check out.

A few hundred feet of nervousness and walking later, nothing had happened. I could see a major road well ahead of us. We were about to put the slag and coal hill behind us, train wrapping around another corner. Some tracks crossed the road we were on, and there was a shack and a parking lot beyond the tracks. It looked like a place people could turn in off the road and check in with a security guard. To the left, between the slag pile and the road, some trees. To the right, a helicopter pad and a small rail yard with more coal cars. Still no people and no biters

"Now we're talking." Jim was happy about the cars in the little parking lot. A red sedan and two white company pickups. "Check if any of the doors are open. Otherwise, smash a window and start hot-wiring one of them." Jim wasn't talking to me.

"I don't know how to hot-wire a car, man."

"No?"

"No." Jasper shook his head, both to confirm the no and out of exasperation.

"Well, shit. Look for keys, I guess."

I wished I knew how to hot wire a car. But I did know how to check for biters. I ran a few steps ahead of Jasper. "Wait." Bending down, I looked under the cars. Nothing. "Okay." Jasper got the hint and checked the beds of the trucks before we tried the car doors. The company trucks were unlocked, but we couldn't find any keys.

Jasper was about to break the driver's window on the sedan when Jim halted him. "Hold up. Might not be chance those trucks are parked here, and I don't want a car alarm going off." Jim jerked his thumb at the shack behind us. "Maybe the security hut has keys."

Jim and Jasper peered into the drive-up window, and apparently didn't see anything, so they went around to the front door. Jim slung his rifle behind his back and pulled his revolver. "Rita's right. Let's be safe. Jasper, you open the door, then cover me with the AK. I'll go in, look for the keys. Rita, you keep watch away from the security hut, somewhere you can see well."

I backed up, keeping an eye on the road and the leftover coal cars stashed in the rail yard. Jasper opened the door. Jim paused. "Smells like shit," he declared, before disappearing into the building. It wasn't long before I heard two muffled gunshots. I immediately ran to help, but Jasper held up his hand, holding me back. He walked inside carefully, but stopped when Jim called out. "I'm fine. Fuck!, gunshots are loud indoors. We need silencers. Or something for our ears."

"Biter?" Jasper asked.

"One. On the ground. Fucked up. No stomach, no guts. Bloody. Didn't seem to bother it too much. It couldn't stand, but it could still snap at me. Must've gotten mauled by another biter that moved on. Lost most of its torso and still had enough in it to turn." Jim backed into the little hallway where we could see him, shaking his head, clearly troubled by both the sight and the implications. I had no desire to go inside the building and take a look. "I got it for good; it ain't movin' now."

"Keys?"

"Shit. One moment. If they're on the biter, that's too bad. I ain't goin' through its pockets."

A few minutes later Jim emerged, blood on his shoes. He tossed one set of keys to Jasper, keeping another. "Hanging on the wall, right in plain sight." The two men went over to check the trucks while I continued to keep watch, holding my pistol with both hands and keeping it pointed at the ground. The gun was getting heavy, and my heart was still beating fast from the gunshots.

Jim got in the close truck, and it started right up. A moment later, Jasper's truck was also running. "Take 'em both?" Jasper called out.

"Nah," Jim replied. "We could get split up. No walkies or radios to talk to each other on the road. We'll take this one. Rita can ride with me. You should ride in the back. That'll keep a gun ready if we need to bail all the sudden." That made sense. "Hop in, Rita. We got what we needed." It almost seemed too easy, despite Jim needing to shoot a biter. I got in the passenger seat while Jasper climbed in the back of the truck. We drove back the way we came, between the slag ponds and the hill of coal.

It was too easy. "Up there," I pointed at the coal train, about where Jasper peeked through the cars. "Could be a person, could be a biter." Someone had climbed through the cars, to our side of the train. Jim stopped the truck. As I was getting out, a gunshot cracked, followed by what sounded like a huge metal ring. Almost like some sort of messed-up giant gong. That stopped me, and before I could figure out what was going on, Jasper shot his rifle again.

"Got it." I shut my door. More biters. I closed my eyes for a second as Jim got us moving again, wishing the horror away. It didn't work, so I opened them, and looked for more trouble as Jim backed the truck up to the treeline by the spot where we left the boat.

"Rita,"

"Yeah, I'll keep watch." I interrupted Jim as I got out of the truck.

Jim grunted in acknowledgement, congratulated Jasper on his shooting, and the two of them got to work unloading the boat and filling up the truck.

Filling the truck bed actually took a little time, as the two men took the effort to tie everything down and make sure it was secure rather than just let our stuff smash against each other and slide around. They had most of it secured when I saw movement in the trees to the west, where the main road cut between the slag in front of us and the grass ziggurat we saw from the river.

"Company!" I called out a warning and held up my gun, aiming it at the bodies emerging from the trees. It occurred to me that they could be living, thinking I might be a walker from a distance, and aiming a gun at me, but I didn't want to turn away to take cover behind the front of the truck now. But that's something they usually did in the movies. Get behind something before shooting. Either that or the bad guys just always missed, but even I knew that wasn't realistic.

Not living, biters. I could tell by the aggressive lurch, the unnatural walk. Though they didn't look bloody or torn up, more were coming out of the trees. It looked like eight or nine of them. Jim and Jasper ran up from the hill as I aimed my gun, fired, and missed, arms jerking up from the recoil. I needed to figure out how to stop that.

"Shit." Jasper stated the obvious and reached for his rifle. "Kill 'em?"

"No." Jim had done the math. "Not worth the ammo. Go get the last bit, I'll start the car. We have a little time.

Jasper looked like he didn't like that, but ran down the hill to the boat anyway. Jim got in the car and started it. "Get in the cab, Rita!" But I didn't want to leave Jasper uncovered, so I kept my gun pointed at the biters. I fired twice more as they got closer. The first shot missed entirely. The second splashed blood out of the arm of a biter in a suit. The biters were all men for some reason. Finally Jasper ran back up, arms full of bedding, and tossed it in the truck. As he got in the back, I got in the passenger seat and Jim sped off, the biters only twenty yards away. The truck was running the whole time, so it wasn't all that dangerous in the end. I resolved not to get trapped in a car by assuming it would run. Death by dead battery didn't sound appealing.

The truck lurched a bit as Jim rounded the corner and pointed us back at the parking lot, security hut, and the main road into the hills, but he slowed down after we put some distance between us and the biters. I saw another biter emerging from between train cars behind us as we passed the hill of coal. "They seem to like gunfire."

"Fuck yeah, they do," Jim responded. "Kind of a pain in the ass when you need to shoot 'em."


	10. Survivors

Jasper kept watch from the back of the truck, ready to shoot or otherwise take immediate action if we needed to stop. Jim drove us north along some country roads with really dumb names. I don't know why Georgia had a two-lane strip called "Big Texas Valley Road", but it did.

We slowed down at Big Texas Valley Trading Post when we saw what looked like actual people. Two women loading the back of a car with something from the trading post. Just when I was about to take off my seat belt, Jim slammed on the gas and I slammed back into my seat. Jasper fell in the back of the truck, cursing.

Jim kept his foot heavy on the gas, speeding down the road and occasionally swerving to avoid a biter, for at least two miles. Finally he slowed down, allowing Jasper to steady himself by the little window at the back of the cab and yell in. "What the hell was that?"

"You saw those women loading firewood and whatnot into the car?"

"Yeah. We could've stopped. Asked 'em what it's like thereabouts."

"On the other side of the road, by the electrical substation, I saw two men. Army fatigues, rifles. Two very hungry looking men. And a broken sign at the turnoff south. There's a little reservoir right there, below Rock Mountain, the quarry we talked about. Some islands with choke points you can guard, little hydroelectric dam on the lake. Perfect place for the national guard to set up camp, create a refuge," Jim explained.

"Well why don't we go back?" I asked. "The national guard and electricity sounds good to me."

"The soldiers looked hungry?" Jasper asked his own question, anticipating something I didn't see.

"Soldiers are the first to be fed, especially if you're scared of biters," Jim explained. "An' they don't hide on the side of the road if'n it's a real refuge. They fix the sign. More than that, if there's a real refuge with soldiers, they don't send out unarmed women to do something risky like loot a store while they hide. Not unless shit's hit the fan, the soldiers ain't answering to anybody, an' they sure as hell scared shitless if they're going to force civilians to do something dangerous like gather supplies"

"We still could have talked to them," I said, disgruntled.

"I'm not allowing my gun to be taken again," Jasper answered. "Not by some national guard wannabe. Soldiers and police don't like it when other people have guns, too."

Jim turned left onto Route Twenty-Seven. There was a lumber yard at the junction of the roads. A lumber yard, and nothing else. This countryside was weird. Little businesses in the middle of nowhere, with nothing else around, until a half a mile down the road another place popped up in the trees. In Utah we clustered things in towns and small cities. There were stretches of desert with nothing, sure, but they were actually empty. That's what made Alabama weird; their middle-of-nowhere was both lonely and crowded at the same time.

We passed a cemetery, no walking dead, and a church, one biter in the parking lot, before turning onto Farmersville Road. And this area was farmersville, as far as I could tell. Occasional long driveways branching off the road, leading to houses on rises amidst lots of fields. The road was more or less empty, except when we passed the turnoff for "4 L Rodeo". Jim sped up and zipped past two biters tearing apart a bull lying on the right side of the road.

I had a good view of the scene. One biter, a man in an ill-fitting suit, tore entrails and intestines out of the bull, trying to bite off a piece but failing. The other biter, a once-blonde woman, was more or less hidden except for the back of her head. She was practically diving into the hole left by the man's activities. Butt in the air, she was pushing her face into the disemboweled animal, presumably trying for tasty innards like some sort of demonic apple-bobbing contest.

The worst part, came as Jim sped up and I looked back. The animal, not quite dead, lifted its head slightly at our passing. It didn't have the strength to make a sound or call out. I had to hold my stomach, suddenly nauseous at the horror of such suffering. To live through that for who knows how long before dying, it was too horrible for words.

"Guess they ain't picky." Jim spoke, but I ignored him, still sick to my stomach.

Farmersville Road became Gore Sublinga Road. We passed a few more farms, most looking more like ramshackle shacks next to crops than stately manors, and then saw people up ahead. A lot. Five pickups and a few SUVs were gathered on the road and on the lawn in front of a house flying a big American flag. Jasper stood up in the back of the truck as Jim stopped the truck, well away from the group. He tapped on the glass with the butt of his rifle to get our attention. "Jim, you better be the one to talk to these guys."

"Ayup."

Jim turned to me. "You know how to drive?"

"Yeah," I answered, before thinking better of the lie. "Well, kinda. I took my first lessons."

"Jesus." Jim moved something next to the steering column. "It's in reverse. When I get out, move into my seat. If something goes bad, wait for me to jump in the back of the truck, then hit the gas. Get us back to Farmersville Road, or stop when you can't see them anymore."

"What!?"

"Only if something goes bad." Jim got out of the truck, waving to a man walking up the road to talk to him. The man was blonde, very large, and wearing plaid. I got into the driver's seat, settled myself, and saw the blonde man stop in front of Jim. The blonde had a rifle, but it was pointed at the ground. Jim's revolver stayed at his hip. I looked around to see what else was going on, but didn't see much besides men, women, and children looking at us from near the gathered cars. Looks like they were preparing to go somewhere also. I also noticed the flag pole again. Just below the American flag was a Confederate flag, just as big. The South really did seem to put an effort into reinforcing the racist backwater stereotype sometimes.

"Howdy." Jim addressed the man, who stopped and smiled warmly.

"Greetings, brother. Fare thee well, in these End Times?" Seriously?

"Still kickin' and screamin'."

"Are you a god-fearing man, brother?" Getting right to the fear. Fun.

Jim paused before answering, probably wanted to be careful with what he said. The pause didn't seem out of place. It flowed with the stranger's slow country drawl, which seemed to place extra importance on each word said out loud. "The Savior and I are at peace with one another."

Another big smile. "Good news! The lord has spared the faithful and true, and sent word through his teachers to gather for judgement. Witness!" The last word was practically yelled, and the man waved his left arm in wide gesture, displaying the people and vehicles behind him. "The true and the faithful gathered amongst one another. My congregation. The Lord's congregation! The church community of Pleasant Hill, together in the apocalypse. When so many, yes even those who called themselves Christian, even our neighbors who claimed to be the Sublinga Church of Christ, so many who were not true of spirit have perished, or have shown their true demonic nature.

"I am Pastor Timothy. And you," Pastor Timothy paused.

"Jim." Jim answered, but he sounded amazed. Did he also think this guy was off his rocker?

"You are more than just Jim. I believe you are one of the pure, for you walk with us even now. The Lord has saved the pure, his Chosen. Though he has also allowed some few to life who torment the wicked or merely provide succor to his Chosen." Pastor Timothy's eyes shifted to Jasper for just a second. "Are you, Jim, ready to be saved?"

"Uh..."

Timothy stepped forward and put his hand on Jim's shoulder, staring into his eyes. "The Lord has called his disparate flocks to assemble at the Church of the Highlands, to unify in prayer and bear witness to the end of the wicked!"

"Birmingham?" Jim finally had some information he could work with. "I'm sorry pastor. I cannot leave my companions, or join you and your flock." The pastor removed his hand from Jim's shoulder, disappointed. I wondered for a moment how Jim knew he was the only one invited. Jasper and I weren't worth saving? Then I looked at the Confederate flag again, waving proudly in front of the house next to the tiny building I assumed was the Pleasant Hill Community Church, and I was pretty sure I knew. "But perhaps I can help you and yours. Avoid Rock Mountain, where there are sinful men, an' avoid Cedar Bluff. Fire and the dead."

"The demonic," Pastor Timothy corrected. "Thank you, brother, and farewell."

Before Pastor Timothy could rejoin his flock, Jim looked for a little information of his own. "Pastor, one question. The road there," Jim pointed to a long driveway leading to some cow sheds across from the Pastor's church. "I was thinking of resting in the area below the hills. Is it safe up there?"

Pastor Timothy smiled sadly at Jim and shook his head. He already thought of him as lost and dead. One of those his God left behind to act upon the faithful, not as real people. "Nowhere is safe, unless you are with the Lord and his Chosen. The Bufords fell to their demonic nature. We, the Chosen, sent them to their judgement. Use their farm as you wish."

"Thank you, Pastor."

"I must return to my flock." Jim watched the other man turn back to his group, which had been watching their leader carefully. Crazy as they were, the men of Peasant Hill Community Church were heavily armed, and watching us carefully.

"Fucking nutjobs," Jasper opined as Jim got back in the truck. I moved over to the passenger seat as Jim grunted in response to Jasper.

"I'd put away the gun and stay low," Jim said, back behind the wheel. "We're going to drive past 'em, and I don't want one of 'em panicking."

Jasper laughed sourly. "Nothing scares a cracker like a black man with a gun." But he sat with his back to the cab and laid the rifle next to him.

Jim waited for the pastor to speak to his Chosen before slowly driving past the assembled convoy and leading taking us up a long driveway and past some cowsheds. I heard some mooing, and thought about the bull we passed not long ago. The base of the hill started just past the sheds, and Jim stopped the car. I could see the farmhouse hidden in the trees covering the hill. The Bufords' former residence, presumably.

We got out of the truck in time to see the Chosen drive off. Jim grunted, happy to see them go. "Should be the last we see of them. Most everyone they know around here dead. They put most of 'em down, and now they're gone. 'Bout as safe a patch of nowhere as we gonna get."

"So we check out the house there, hole up?" Jasper asked. "It's pretty hidden from the road, looks like a good place." Unless the Bufords' dead bodies were in there.

"Nah. Too many cows. They'll draw biters. People, too. I know the hills up here. We're just below Bailey's Gap. I was gonna stop hereabouts even if we didn't run into Pastor Tim. Back in high school I lived in a trailer park up the way. Didn't want to run into biters there, but we're remote here. Far from the towns. Calhoun's the only place big enough to really worry about around here, an' even that's pretty far. Hills meet each other above at Bailey's. Probably still some hunting cabins up in the hills. We can hike up, secure one of those."

"Sounds about as safe as it's going to get," Jasper agreed with Jim's plan. "As long as we find a cabin with a well, or a creek nearby. I don't want to worry about water." Jim nodded.

"We're going to go on foot? Up there?" The brush looked pretty thick to me.

"And you'll be carrying a bunch of stuff, too." Jim was not reassuring. He started pulling things out of the truck with Jasper and packing bags.

When we started hiking into the woods, Jasper was carrying two back packs and his gun. One was giant, meant for multiple days in the wilderness. He had that one on his back. A smaller bag covered his chest. Jim had just one big pack on his back, explaining he'd be leading the way and acting as a scout. I had on two regular school backpacks, front and back like Jasper. And they had me carry a few grocery bags. My twenty-two was in one of the grocery bags, making me nervous.

The hike was exhausting, at least three hours long. Going uphill while carrying fifty pounds of stuff is hard. Thankfully, the forest wasn't as thick as I thought it would be. Occasionally we had to go around thick brush, but for the most part the trees were small but just tall enough to walk under. It wasn't a mountain forest like in California or even Utah, but it was pleasant enough.

We found one cabin fairly early in the hike, but it was old. Moss grew over one side and age had caused most of the roof cave in. Much later, I started to worry about how late in the afternoon it was and when the sun would go down. I had just talked Jasper into another rest for my aching shoulders and back, even though he warned me it wouldn't really help, when Jim returned from scouting ahead of us. He looked happy.

"I found it." Jim wasted no time. "Exactly what we're lookin' for. Relatively new, at least three rooms. Most importantly, there's a lot of trees and a nearby rise that helps hide it from view. We gotta finish climbing up there to those rocks," they weren't that far away, though it looked like a mile and the hillside like a steep mountain, "an' then we'll be able to see it. We can leave the packs there. Rita, you can watch over them while Jasper and I clear the cabin."

"Clear it?" I didn't like the sound of that.

"There's two inside already. Shouldn't be a problem for Jasper and I." Jasper grunted, and checked his gun before putting his second pack on.

"Uh, two what?" I asked, not sure I wanted an answer.

Jim looked down at me. "Two biters. Probly got the flu up here an' turned in the cabin."

We made our way to the rocks. Everyone took off their packs, creating a pretty large pile of stuff. Over the top of the granite boulders, the cabin could just be seen through the woods, about four hundred feet away. The lights were on, clearly marking the one window near the door. Shade and the late afternoon light meant the light from inside glowed enough that I could see a body moving inside the cabin. I couldn't tell if it was a walker. It's not that easy to tell, truth be told. Unless they're lurching after you, hungry for flesh. Or in a horde driven by a wall of flame. Or missing fingertips, with a knife sticking out of the back...

"We'll swing left, stay out of the window's line-of-sight." Jim nodded to his left, beckoning Jasper to follow. The two men took off, guns in hand. I hid below the boulders, next to our supplies, gun in hand. I didn't want to be seen by the biters in the cabin. And part of me didn't want to watch the biters in the cabin.

I waited. And waited. It seemed like forever, though it wasn't really dusk yet. Crazy thoughts ran through my mind. What if they didn't come back. Left me behind, the dumb teenager who couldn't look after myself. I COULD look after myself. I killed one! But I was next to our packs, and that both comforted me and shamed me. They wouldn't leave me behind when I was with the supplies. Was I worth less than a bunch of food and some camping gear?

Then the more realistic fears. What if biters got them, or they were injured and couldn't come back. What if other men who wanted the cabin killed them. They could be shot on accident if someone thought they were biters. I tried not to panic and just gritted my teeth and bore it, making crazy plans for what I'd do if they didn't come back by the time the sun went down and it was dark. I really didn't want to be alone in the woods at night. At least I didn't have to worry about bears! Uh, why not. There could be bears around...

Several gunshots finally interrupted my worrying. There were at least six, surprisingly quiet from my hiding spot behind the boulders. Sounded like two from Jasper's gun, four from Jim's. I realized just then that I could tell the difference between the two guns by sound. Weird.

I scrambled up to the top of the rocks as soon as the shooting stopped, trying to see what happened. The cabin's door swung open, and Jasper walked out, backwards. He, no they, were carrying something. A body. The biter dangled between Jasper and Jim, and even from here I could see the chest was a mess of destroyed blood and flesh. The men dumped the body on the side of the cabin to my right, away from the rise to the left. Then they went back inside, presumably to get the other body.

I climbed down from the boulder I was on when I saw Jasper and Jim emerge from the cabin with the other biter's body. This one was a woman, also with gaping chest wounds. They dropped her next to the other body, then intercepted me halfway in between the cabin and the rocks where I'd been hiding. Both men's hands had blood on them, and there was some on their clothes as well.

They both looked grim. Even scary, when Jim held up his red hands to stop me. "Whoa, Rita. Still a lotta work to do."

"Are you okay? Both of you are okay?"

"We're fine, hun'," Jasper said. Though he sounded tired rather than reassuring. "No problems. They were both surprised."

"Jasper and I need to do something about the bodies. Gonna put 'em in the ground, I think. You don't wanna deal with that." That was true. "So why don't you bring the packs up to the cabin? I know you're tired, but we're almost done for the day."

"Ok. Okay," I said again, relieved they were both fine. Jasper came with me to get a little "trenching tool," kind of a mini-shovel from his pack. By the time I carried the same pack, sans tool, up to the cabin, both men were digging a grave. Jim seemed to have found a full-sized shovel from the cabin.

It didn't take them too long to dig the graves. They were pretty shallow, which made sense to me. I was exhausted carrying heavy packs from the rocks to the cabin. And I'd been resting while they fought. By the time I'd piled our packs in front of the cabin, they'd get bloody if I put them on the floor inside, the men had covered the two dead biters.

Dusk was finally upon us, the sky growing darker. Jim and Jasper joined me, still looking uncomfortable, as I brought the last of the packs to the cabin's tiny porch. I still hadn't been inside yet. The trail of blood leading through the doorway stopped me.

"We gotta clean that up." Jim noticed me looking at the blood. "There's a water pump that side of the cabin." Jim pointed to the side of the cabin without fresh graves. "Why don't you two find a bucket or pan or something an' scrub the floors. Toss out the rug, too. It's ruined, an' you can use that to soak up most of the rest of the blood."

"Uh-huh." Jasper said, not liking the plan. "And what are you going to be doing while we clean house?"

"I'm going to find their wood-choppin' axe. Then I'm gonna keep watch out here. In case the area's not as biter-free as we hoped, an' they come sniffin' out the gunshots." Jim stared Jasper down. "Unless you wanna go hand-to-hand with 'em?"

I think Jasper would have chosen guard duty, but he glanced up at the darkening sky, and over at Jim's foul mood, and nodded in acceptance.

Shit. That meant I had to scrub blood off of wooden floors.


	11. Dinner And A Shower

Jasper was quiet while we scrubbed the floors. I asked him once if the biters gave him any trouble when the men cleared the cabin. He grunted some sort of response, and I got the hint. Jasper was in a mood. Eventually we finished and after dumping bloody water on the ground far enough away from the cabin, we headed to the water pump to clean off the pot we'd been using. Jim found us there.

"All finished up?" Jim carried an axe, with a clean head.

"Yep. Clean as it's going to get," I answered.

"Looks like we're remote enough. No biters came 'round to check out the gunshots."

"At least that's good," Jasper replied.

"Check this out," Jim pointed out a step ladder leaning against the cabin. "The cabin is a little dug into the ground here, an' with the ladder it's really easy to refill that tank on the roof from the water pump. Fill up some pots, dump the water in, an' the reservoir supplies the shower."

"Shower?!" I almost yelled. I was smelling pretty ripe.

"A shower," Jim confirmed. "Solar heater too, which'll bring the water up to lukewarm if we let it work. We should let Jasper go first. He's been doing the heavy lifting all day." I was disappointed, but that was true. "They'll have to be quick showers; the water tank isn't that big. An' the next couple of showers will be cold tonight. But this is going to be nice in the coming weeks."

"Shit," Jasper said, wearing the first smile I'd seen since we arrived at the cabin. "I'm gonna clean this blood off right now." He went towards the front door, already unbuttoning his shirt.

Jim led me in the same direction. "What you need to do right now is check out the kitchen. See what we've got; put the food from our packs in the cupboards. You're gonna use that kitchen a lot. Better get comfy in it." Made sense, though so far it seemed like Jasper was the best cook.

The kitchen was small, but functional. A sink, without a faucet, a small range hooked up to a propane tank, and an icebox. The icebox had beer in it, but no ice. The first cupboard I looked into had a five-pound bag of rice, which made me feel safe.

And then my whole body froze as a gunshot crashed through the cabin. And again. A third shot, and I was hyperventilating, going too far from safe to under threat! That was Jim's gun, but not the rifle, the revolver.

The layout of the cabin was simple. A sitting room, with a couch and a fireplace, a small kitchen connected to the sitting room, a short hallway that ran along one wall of the cabin from the sitting room to the bathroom and the bedroom. Square, smaller than your average home in a trailer park. The sitting room was empty. I ran to the hall. Down at the end, the bedroom door was closed. Jim walked out of the bathroom, where I could still hear Jasper's shower running.

"Ain't no point keepin' niggers around if'n they got an opportunity to turn on you. 'Specially if they sweet on your woman." Oh, shit. "And don't you worry, one of the guys on Buffington clued me in to what's what. You're dark, but you ain't black. Told me you're Indian. Uh, sorry. Native American. I love the Cherokee. Proud people. Ain't no beef there."

Okay, I'm not Native American, I'm just American, and my parents were born in India, but I sure wasn't going to tell a racist murderer that. What did he say about his woman? That's bad. I never met a wife. He couldn't mean... oh, shit.

Jim came up to me and slipped an arm around my shoulders. I froze. What should I do? I had absolutely no idea what to do. "I know this is gonna be hard on ya, Rita. You an' Jasper was gettin' along. What you gotta remember is that you're safe here. I'll keep you safe and secure. Ain't no one gonna threaten you when I'm around. You ain't gonna feel it yet, but we got a good thing here. A real good thing. You'll come around." I would? I didn't think so.

"Tough day. Gonna be tougher, but come morning we're set. We'll move the body after dinner. Let it bleed out in the shower now. It's got a drain goes down to the septic. You be good, an' make us some dinner while we wait." Body?

I pulled away from Jim and staggered towards the bathroom door. The bathroom didn't have anything but a tiny counter, no sink, a toilet and a the shower, both fed from a pipe going to the ceiling. And Jasper. Slumped in the corner, under the shower nozzle. Two bullet holes in his chest, blood pouring out of them. Another hole right in the middle of his neck. His eyes were lifeless, and I lost all doubt. Jasper was dead. I cried out, a wordless sob, and backed out of the doorway.

Into Jim. I backed into him, froze again, and he put his arms around me, holding me close, telling me it would be all right. I tried to get away, but he held tight, preventing me from leaving that cursed doorway. Jasper's dead eyes refused to stare at me as I failed to get away. He was just a dead body, slumped over and wet in the shower. "Why?"

"Fuck. I told ya. That kind, they'll kill you if there's profit in it." What about you? "Come on." Jim pulled me to the kitchen, away from the bathroom and the dead man I knew. "We're both hungry, make something." Jim let me go. I stood there for a second, not knowing what to do. Jim prodded me, pushing my shoulder, and I took a step forward. Hands shaking, I reached down to the cupboard with the rice and opened it. I put the rice on the counter, then got the a clean pot. Don't use the one we used to clean up biter blood. Take the clean pot outside. It's pretty dark, now. Jim is following me. Fill the pot up with water, bring it back inside. Don't look at Jim. Don't look at him. Put the pot on the range. Turn the handle on the propane tank. Turn the knob on the range. Hit the clicky thing that makes a spark.

I cooked the rice, slowly. The water seemed to boil before I was ready to put the rice in, and I let the pot boil over once, making a mess. But I didn't really care. When the rice was done, I got a can from my pack and a can opener from Jasper's pack. "Ugh. Rice and beans." Fear shot through me. I struggled not to show it. "Go on. It'll do."

I heated up the beans, searching the kitchen for some spices to make it better. I didn't want Jim mad at me. I didn't want to die. Cumin, salt, black pepper, paprika. Not the best mix. What if he hates it? Where's my gun? Jim was watching me cook. I couldn't look for the gun. I put rice on two plates and poured beans over the rice, then set the plates on the small table before going back for salt and pepper. "Sit." I sat, across from Jim. He ate almost half of his plate before realizing I wasn't eating. "Eat." I ate. It wasn't that bad. I felt horrible for liking it.

Jim got up and found some cups in kitchen, filling them from a plastic water jug the previous occupants left. He brought us water and I drank, watching him watch me, and tried to figure out why there were still kitchen sounds when Jim was back at the table. Jim heard them too, and had already stood up when Jasper walked into the sitting room.

I froze, horror rooting me to the chair, ashamed and frightened of what had been done to Jasper, shocked to see his corpse lurch towards us. Jim was still wearing his revolver. The one that already killed Jasper. He pulled it again and fired once, twice, three times. The first bullet hit Jasper in the shoulder, twisting his body. The second hit him in the head, breaking his face where the nose met the eyes, and the third bullet missed, embedding itself into the cabin's wall. Jasper fell to his knees as Jim kept pulling the trigger on his gun, which made a clicking sound now that it was out of bullets.

"Motherfucker." I silently agreed with Jim, hate building in me for what he did to Jasper. Twice! Even though I knew the second time wasn't really Jasper, it was like I saw the first time. When Jim murdered our companion. He's a murderer, I realized, putting a word to it. Fear swept down my spine again. "Come here," the murderer said. I complied. "Pick up his legs." The murderer and I struggled with the body, taking it outside near the shallow graves dug earlier that day.

We dumped Jasper's twice-dead corpse on the ground. It didn't start moving again. I tried to figure out if the murderer would kill me, too. For some reason, I didn't think so, but I was not confident in that conclusion. "He hadn't had the flu for a week." What? "No bites, no scratches, sure-as-hell no fever. Healthy as a horse, carryin' those packs today." The murderer was talking about Jasper. "Didn't die of the flu, didn't die of a bite. What the fuck? If getting shot makes you turn..."

The murderer and I both looked at the shallow graves at the same time, which is how I found out I already knew. Deep inside. I wondered if Jasper helped plan that murder too, or if he didn't know before he pulled the trigger. Trusting the murderer's lies; mistaking the living for the dead. I preferred it that way.

One of the person-sized piles of dirt shifted on its own. Definite movement. "Fuck me." The murderer left. I watched, morbidly fascinated, watching for a second bit of movement, seeing it. It came from the middle of the mound, and then more of the grave moved. A bulge appeared, and a hand from the bulge, and a foot kicked out of the end of the grave. The dead, born a second time. No part of me wondered if it was the third time.

The murderer came back in time to see the hands and feet push against the solid earth to either side of the shallow grave, in time to see the ruined chest and intact head emerge from the dirt. I watched the biter - fuck it. I watched the zombie rise from its grave, hungry, mindless. More frightening than an angry beast. The murderer took his axe and split the zombie's skull open. Hit it again, needlessly, the corpse already falling still. I could see fear in the murderer's eyes, and knew why. It didn't matter how people died. They would all turn.

The murderer and I waited for the second zombie to rise from its grave, to seek vengeance on its murderer. Or his accomplice. Finally, it did, and the axe fell again, the dead fell quiet once more, and the murderer and I double-checked the broken skulls of the three victims.

The murderer went to go inside, but followed me instead, when I went to the other side of the cabin. Working the water pump, I slowly filled up the reservoir that fed the shower. Finally I felt ready to clean the shower, washing the remnants of Jasper's blood down the drain before washing myself. Then I filled the reservoir again, so that the murderer could take his own cold shower. The murderer took a gun in the bathroom with him, and I realized I didn't know where he hid my twenty-two. Or the other rifle.

Tonight it didn't matter. I cleaned up in the kitchen as the shower finished its final task that night. Then the murderer and I went to bed.


	12. Chapter 12

Strangely enough, I slept well. Jim and I shared the only bed in the cabin, which felt safe. He took off his boots before going to bed, but I just cleaned my shoes and kept them on. It made me feel ready for anything.

By the time I woke up, Jim was already gone. I found him in the kitchen, cooking eggs. "Still good. They left behind a fair amount of food. Scrambled, or omelette?"

"Omelette. Thank you."

"Listen, Rita, I want you to spend a fair amount of time on dinner tonight. Do something special you know how to do. Even if it doesn't have meat." Everything seemed strangely domestic. And very wrong. I went to the bathroom, to pee and to give myself time to think. I only came up with more questions.

"Aren't we going to leave today?"

"Why on earth would we do that, babe?"

"Uh, the biters," I pointed to the side of the cabin where Jasper and the previous occupants were. Jim smiled at me patronizingly, like my worries were those of a child. "And what if..." what if someone like us came to take the cabin? "What if someone living came up and wanted to take what we have?"

Jim nodded more seriously. "Well, I wanna take care of both concerns today. I'm gonna scout around the cabin; familiarize myself with the area. That'll keep predators off of us, an' it'll help make you safe. You should stay here. It'll be better than in the woods. You'll be busy, though."

"With what?" I didn't like the idea of being alone. I liked the idea of being alone and lost in the wilderness alone even worse. "It'd be better if I was with you. I should get my bearings, too."

Jim's face lost all friendliness and he shook his head no. I wasn't going to get to leave the cabin today. "There's too much to do here. You need to refill the roof tank with water. Bring water into the kitchen and boil it for later. You need to cut wood for fuel. An' before all that, you need to bury the bodies away from the cabin, make sure they don't mess up the water the well draws from."

"The bodies." A chill went through me. "I can't..."

"You can. There's a spot not too far, downhill. I rigged up a sledge for ya, so you'll be able to move 'em."

"A sledge?"

"Something you drag along the ground. Here." Jim put my omelette on a plate. "I'll show you, and then you can eat."

We went outside and he showed me the sledge, which looked like a stretcher attached to a loop of cloth to drag it. Jim had already rolled the woman he murdered onto the sledge. The other bodies were ready for the same. "See that clearing down there?" I nodded. "That should be far enough from the well. Drag 'em down there. Dig graves, deep, and fill 'em back up. Get started right after breakfast." Jim took my shoulder and guided me back to the cabin. A shot of fear ran though me when he touched me. "Or they'll probly stink worse."

Halfway though the omelette, I was pretty sure that wasn't fair. "You can't help with the burial?"

Jim finished checking something on his rifle before replying. "Nah, babe. I gotta get up in the woods before anyone who don't like us comes 'round." I wondered if he thought he'd need to murder more people, or if part of him felt guilty about those he already killed and that was why he didn't want to handle their bodies. "Time to get cracking. Your twenty-two is on the couch, just in case." So it was. Surprised, I hardly noticed Jim leave the cabin.

I brought my gun with me outside, sniffed at the dead bodies, ew!, took the shovel, and got to work.

Digging graves is hard labor. I was exhausted by the time I had three graves that I figured were damn well deep enough. As tired as I was, dragging the bodies over while trying not to retch from the smell was even harder. Jasper was so heavy I fell down twice dragging his body. I filled his grave in last, then collapsed against a tree. I wanted to leave. It still smelled like rotten pork. But instead I just cried. No-holds-barred bawling. I cried until I didn't have any tears in me, and then sat. Just mired in sadness, not thinking much. Not until I started thinking of my family, and wishing without hope that they were both alive and not having to deal with this kind of insanity.

Jim found me there, shortly before dusk, wondering if everyone I knew was dead. Except Jim. I was starting to know him. Which was its own horror. "Come on." Jim pulled me up by my arm and marched me uphill. He brought me inside the cabin, and didn't scold me for not getting everything done. "Wash the worst off, then get cookin'. I'll do the rest."

And that's more or less how the evening went. I spent a few hours in the kitchen trying to cook something nice over the little range while Jim chopped wood, refilled the cabin's reservoir, and brought drinking water inside.

We didn't' say much as we ate, aside from one short update. "Not much in the hills. I've got the better approaches down, so I'll be able to watch them efficiently. Killed two biters headed our way, that was the big excitement of the day."

I wondered how far from the cabin he'd been hiking. I figured it would take at least three hours to get to where we left the stolen truck, if I didn't get lost on the way. "I didn't hear any gunshots."

"Nah. Got 'em with the trenching tool. Quiet. We won't draw any more up here that way." Killing walkers quietly. Another thing that made Jim, a larger and stronger person than me, useful to have around. I stabbed at my food in frustration.

The evening was a little cool. Jim had me sit next to him on the couch and started a fire in the fireplace. He put his arm around me, and we started into the flames, thinking our own dark thoughts. It wasn't cold enough to need the fire, but I stared at it anyway. I went to bed early, exhausted from all the physical labor.

In the morning, I hurt. My shoulders and feet still hurt from the hike up to the cabin. My arms and bach ached horribly from the digging yesterday. Breakfast was hash browns, disturbingly similar to my grandmother's potato cakes. Though we only had mustard to go with the hash browns. I wasn't sure if chutney would've been nice or too much like my old life.

Jim left for the hills early, insisting that was the best way to keep danger away. He also said something about looking for the car the cabin's occupants used to get to Bailey's Gap, to see if it had supplies. It occured to me that the closest road to the cabin would be where their car was parked, assuming they knew where they were going when they came up here. I suggested I should come along to help carry any supplies he found, but Jim immediately dismissed that as too dangerous.

My big task for the day was "getting the kitchen in order." I started by laying on the bed and feeling sorry for myself for an hour, until I was sure Jim was well away. Then I left the cabin, looked down at Jasper's grave, and went to the other side of the building. Free from the sight of my dead companion, I stretched. I went through every single warm-up stretch Coach Wittingham made us do in P.E., even the extra ones for indoor days. I did them in order, and did as many repetitions as I could. It felt good; a pleasant sort of ache rippled through my injured muscles. Coach would be proud. She always tried to convince us her class was the most important, that fitness got us ready for everything else going on in our lives. Who knew she'd be right?

After stretching, I practiced aiming my gun, though I didn't actually fire it. Then I chopped some wood, refilled the reservoir for the evening's shower, and set about seriously organizing the kitchen. By the time Jim returned home, I had rice ready and a decent set of spices cooking in a pan for a real dinner. He barged in through the door, startling me. I reached for my gun before I realized it was him. Luckily, Jim didn't see that. He was too busy setting a heavy dufflebag on the couch.

"Found the car! Mmm, that smells good. Keep doing what you're doing, honey. I'm starving." Success filled Jim with energy. "Gonna head back tomorrow too, they were probably only up here for a night. Still a lot in their car. I brought the important stuff up today, but there's some cans and bottled water left to go. I'll look after it after patrol tomorrow. How's dinner going?"

"Another twenty minutes or so, I didn't know when you'd be home."

"That's great, babe."

"So where was the car?" I glanced at Jim casually, trying not to reveal I was trying to read him.

"A couple of hills over." Jim didn't point in a direction. He wasn't looking at me either, keeping his voice light.

"Is it, uh, something we could use in a pinch? If something goes wrong?"

"Maybe." Jim took his time considering that question. "No keys though. I'd have to hot-wire it."

"How do you do that? Hot-wire a car?"

Jim laughed, though it wasn't funny. "Now, now. That's not a skill for a lady. Plus, it depends on the car. An' there's no way to show you up here." I didn't ask to go to the car with him so he could show me. I got the point.

While I finished setting out dinner, Jim worked the crank on a machine he brought back from the dead couple's car. "It's a radio," he explained. "Hand-crank, for when you don't have batteries AND the power is out. Pretty old, but it should still work." Jim fiddled with it in between complimenting me on my cooking. Which wasn't bad, truth be told. I'd found some tumeric hidden away in the cupboards, which according to my mother could make anything taste halfway decent.

"Damn."

"What's wrong," I asked.

"Nothing from The Last Radioman's channel. Or anything on AM. I'll keep trying after dinner." And that's what we did for most of the evening. Sat on the floor or the couch and fiddled with the radio. Jim kept hoping The Last Radioman would come on, but no luck. Finally he tried "shortwave frequencies". Again static. It took awhile to cycle through what the radio could do, since Jim insisted on listening carefully to each bit of static before turning the dial a little bit.

I got tired of the futility, and took my evening shower. I dressed in a hurry after showering, rushed by the soft sounds of some unknown singer coming from the sitting room. Jim was sitting on the couch, angry, listening to the music. I could tell just by his tense body language Jim wasn't happy about finding a working radio station.

"What's wrong?"

"Listen," he bit off.

I couldn't make out the words. It was some old recording. Not jazz, but from a quiet style where you had a few instruments and a singer. I listened harder, but the words weren't in English. "I don't get it."

"It's French," Jim said. "I could live with Spanish. But this is fucking French." I still didn't get it, so I stood in the hallway and waited for him to explain. "It's coming through on an AM channel; I didn't find anything on shortwave. Well actually a few half words, but nothing recognizable. If you do it right, shortwave can go halfway round the world. Cloud patterns and whatnot can fuck it up, but whatever. You can do that with shortwave. Not with fucking AM. This is just some bullshit pop station that was lucky enough to have the power stay on. But it ain't English, or even Spanish, so it's coming from halfway across the world."

"Canada?" I suggested.

"Whatever. Look, the only way we get an AM signal from that far is if there's no interference. As in hardly anyone else using radio, anywhere in the world. We can hear it, because there's no one else alive out there using the radio to talk."

"Oh."

"Yeah. Oh." Jim emphasized. "Fuck this shit, I'm goin' to bed." And he did, dirt and all. I resolved to shake out the bedding tomorrow. Then I cleaned up the kitchen, toyed with the radio until I was confident I knew how to use it, and joined Jim in the bed.

Next morning I was still sore, but I expanded my P.E. stretching routine with sit-ups and push-ups. Rule #1 was cardio, but I believed in the importance of being in shape in general. I still ended up with a lot of time on my hands. I resolved to think carefully about survival. What I needed to do to avoid being eaten when we finally left the cabin. I don't know why I was so sure we would eventually leave the cabin, but I was. Despite my resolve, I found myself thinking about my family. After a few hours of needless pain and worry, I realized I needed to come up with a way to deal with the fact I'd never see my family again.

I decided to imagine them alive, and happy, in another world. Some Star Trek alternate dimension thing. They were dead in that I'd never see them again. But I didn't know they were dead for sure. So why not imagine them happy, but unreachable. Unreachable was good. If I couldn't ever reach them, then maybe the biters couldn't. I didn't imagine them with Krishna, or awaiting reincarnation, or in some Christian heaven, but actually alive. As long as I accepted I'd never see them again, why not imagine the best?

Jim returned in the evening, with a refilled dufflebag, and another story about killing a biter. I put the supplies from the dufflebag in the kitchen, and we had dinner. Jim was more relaxed than he'd been over the last few days. Comfortable. It made me worry. He complimented me on dinner, doing his best to make it seem like he meant it, and wondered if he'd get lucky and run across game, meaning animals to hunt, out in the woods. I guessed that was going to be our routine. Jim up in the hills during the day. Me, in the cabin, never leaving. I shivered.

"Still sore, babe?" Jim misinterpreted my discomfort. "Come here." He went over to the couch and patted his lap. "Come here!" He repeated himself when I didn't join him the first time. I went over and sat next to him. Jim rolled his eyes and put his hands around my waist, pulling me up and sitting me between his legs. "You could use a massage." I tensed up, and his hands placed themselves on my shoulders, pushing into my sore muscles and beginning to knead. It actually felt pretty good, and when Jim started also massaging my neck, I relaxed and leaned back a bit.

Until I felt something poking me in my back, just above my butt. It couldn't be another finger... oh. I pulled away from Jim and tried to stand up, but he pulled me back down on the couch and up against him, so I was lying against his chest, his penis pressing into my back. "Rita, I know it's been a rough few days. Believe me, I know. But we're settled now, safe alone. I want you to enjoy tonight. We're together now, and people who are together look after each other's needs. I'm a man, and men have needs."

I shot up, pulling away from his hands, and turned around. Facing him, I put my hands out to keep him back. "NO! I'm not... I don't want to." Jim didn't chase me, or follow me, he just sat there on the couch, watching me slowly back into the hallway. I didn't know where I was going, I just wanted to increase the distance.

Jim's face lost its friendliness. "Listen, girl," there was absolutely no respect in the way he said girl, "do you think I brought you up here for the fun of it? Because I wanted to look after a useless little thing like you? Shit, look at you. You couldn't fight off a biter. You can barely even manage to play house. When you've got all damn day to do a little bit of work. I'm keeping you alive. And I'm offering companionship. You could be a little fucking grateful." Jim thought for a moment, then relaxed again, a smile reappearing. "You'll get used to it. Hopefully you'll enjoy tonight." Jim stood up, and I backed up a few steps. "We're together now, which makes you lucky, that I'm willing to take care of a helpless little thing like yourself. All women need a man to take care of him, now more than ever. That's why you made me love you." Love me? There was no love here.

I rushed to the bedroom door, opened it, ran into the room, and slammed the door behind me. Jim turned the handle despite my attempts to hold onto it, and shoved the door open. I stumbled forward, pushed by the door. Jim picked me up and threw me onto the bed. I laid on my back, and Jim fell onto me, crushing me into the mattress. He put my head in his hands while I struggled, helpless under his weight. "It's natural for women too. The need. It's not as strong, but this is good for you, too."

When I stopped struggling, giving up against his weight, Jim kissed my forehead. Then he ran his lips across my ear. I closed my eyes and tried not to hyperventilate, to pull myself together and regain control. I failed. Fear ran though me, and disgust, a sick nausea in my stomach. I'd never had sex before, but I knew it was supposed to be good, and this was horrible. I was afraid of how horrible it would be.

Jim kissed my lips several times, one hand on my throat, before standing up. For a moment, I thought he was going to let me go. But he remained above me, looming, and began to strip. First his shirt, revealing his hairy chest, then his shoes, socks, pants, and finally I could see it, angry and hard. I remained frozen. Not so much paralyzed, as unable to see a solution. A way to run and escape without him grabbing me and pinning me again. Jim began unbuttoning my jeans after getting naked himself. "No." He ignored me.

He took off my pants, and underwear, and I felt more vulnerable. I didn't want to acknowledge my vagina was there, feel the air on my privates. It felt like there was no way out. "You're a gorgeous little thing. A beautiful woman," Jim said, running his hand through my pubic hair. "Not too bad. I think I'll get rid of it later." Huh? Jim ran his hands up my legs, then up and down the insides of my legs, before forcing them open.

He winked at me. "Don't say I wasn't gentle." Kneeling between my legs, Jim put his head to my crotch and started licking. I looked around the bedroom now that he wasn't towering in front of me, confused. Jim was licking my vulva and my clitoris, which was really gross. His hands rubbed my thighs. I realized it was supposed to feel good. I was a virgin, but it's not like I didn't talk to other girls. I'd read Cosmopolitan. I know what being eaten out was. You were supposed to like it. Jim's tongue just made me feel dirty. His saliva covered my vulva like a layer of filth, tastebuds rough and abrasive against my unresponsive clitoris.

Finally he stopped, standing up again and looking at me, maybe to see if I was enjoying it. I don't know what he thought he saw, but he stood me up, pulling me against his chest while keeping my legs trapped against the bed. He pulled my shirt and my bra off. I worried about my bra for a second. Life in the mountains would be a lot worse without a decent bra. Then I was back on the bed, Jim's hands enjoying my breasts.

After a minute of that, and a few compliments on his part, Jim turned me over, clapped his hands on my butt and used his feet to spread my legs. "No," I said again, almost whispering. I tried to stand and pull away, but I failed. I felt Jim's penis between my legs, the heat unmistakable. Then he reached down, forced the tip into the opening of my vagina, and raped me.

I cried out into the mattress, surprised at how much it hurt. Jim crushed me with his weight, hands enjoying my breasts, making me feel small and overwhelmed. He told me he'd be gentle, but it was not gentle. It hurt. Jim talked dirty in my ear and told me I was enjoying it each time he heard my muffled grunts of pain.

Eventually, finally, he rammed me into the bed hard, came in me, and stopped making it worse. I cried softly, afraid of being pregnant. The worst part of the fear was worrying that if I was pregnant I'd be more dependent on Jim. He laid on top of me, crushing me with his weight, penis slowly going soft inside me, one of his hands idly fingering my clitoris. That felt warm and unpleasantly scratchy. Finally, he got off me, but only long enough to put me up and lay me in the bed normally. That was more comfortable than being bent over it, but Jim got in the bed with me and held me, pulling my back to his chest. I laid with him, cold inside despite the warmth of his body, wondering when he'd let me go.

"I didn't realize I'd be your first." Thanks for reminding me, asshole. "Thought you were a wild Injun filly, but you were just a shy colt." Jim nibbled at my ear. "It always hurts the first time." Liar. "Wait until you see what it's like when it's good all the way through." Fear.

Jim started to tell me how lucky I was to be with him again, and I just tuned him out, feeling the hurt in my vagina die down and staring at the wood of the wall across from me. It had a lot of cracks in it. Time passed. Jim stood up, then pulled me to my feet when I remained motionless on the bed. "We still gotta clean up from dinner." I started looking on the floor for my clothes. "Nah," Jim pulled me to the hallway, a horrible impish quality to his voice, "you're too beautiful. I want to just watch you."

Naked, he took me down the hall to the main room and connected kitchen. He sat down on the couch, penis small and resting between his legs, waiting for me. Slowly, shamefully, I put the leftovers in tupperware. We didn't have ice, but it would keep well enough for lunch tomorrow. It was horrid, Jim watching me. Slowly, I started washing dishes and cleaning up, naked breasts and legs holding Jim's attention. This was almost as bad as the rape. Moving on my own, I felt almost complicit.

Jim yawned as I finished. I went to the bathroom and put on my clothes while Jim showered. After washing, he came into the bedroom, made me take my clothes off again, and we slept next to each other, naked. At least, he slept. I dozed off, and woke again, afraid. Dozed off and woke again, disgusted by the feel of him against me, still afraid. Dozed off, and woke again, still afraid. I got up and went to get my gun. I checked the magazine, like Jim showed me, and saw it did actually have bullets in it. I woke up from the nightmare, the one that started before I went to sleep, and thought. Very simple thoughts. What am I going to do right now?

I wanted to kill him. For hurting me. For making me unclean. For raping me. I imagined killing him, walking right into the bedroom, full of naked fury, putting every bullet through his chest and leaving him to rise as a biter. Then I thought about myself alone in the morning, in the forest, carrying a heavy pack and not knowing where I was going. Thought about shooting a biter, and another closing in on me after following the sound of the gunshot, and not having any choice but to shoot again, hoping I still had bullets in Jasper's rifle. I thought about sleeping alone, in the open, with no one on watch. Jim sicked me, enraged me, made me feel weak, and I was afraid of him. But not as afraid as I was of being alone. Of dying.

That was the problem. I was afraid of dying. If I wasn't afraid of being eaten by a biter, of being vulnerable and alone, I could kill Jim right now. Instead, I put the gun back on the mantle, went to the bathroom, walked back into the bedroom, looked at my clothes on the floor with longing, and rejoined Jim in the bed. I felt him push against me lazily; felt an arm reaching over and cupping a breast.

"Where were you babe?"

I closed my eyes, and summoned all my will to force myself to ignore the sexual contact and answer him: "I just had to pee. Go back to sleep." Jim fell quiet again. I stared at the wall of the little bedroom, trying to find familiar cracks in the wood despite the lack of light.


	13. Rabbit Stew

I was laying in bed, afraid, when Jim finally woke up in the morning. I could barely keep from trembling, for fear of what he'd do to me. He made morning noises, stretched, then leaned over and kissed me on the cheek. I closed my eyes when he did, hating being a part of that. "Good morning, gorgeous."

We had breakfast and Jim went out on his usual walk through the woods. I think he enjoyed them, and for all I knew he helped keep the hordes of biters away from the cabin. After making sure Jim had left for the day, I went back into the bedroom, cried for a good hour, and fell asleep. I was exhausted. Not just emotionally. Also physically, after managing only a few minutes of sleep here and there during the night.

Eventually, sometime late in the afternoon, I got up and began the most basic of chores. Preparing water for the shower and starting rice for dinner. I did the tasks filled with dread, horrified by the realization that Jim would return soon. And, the one time I imagined him not returning, scared by the idea of going through the night wondering who killed him and whether I'd be next.

Jim did come back to the cabin in the evening, none the worse for his day. He even brought a dead rabbit with him. Joy. At least, Jim thought I should be happy. Instead, it was disgusting. We figured out how to skin it and remove the guts together. And after getting my arms covered in dead rabbit blood, he buried the fur and entrails behind the cabin so that bears or something didn't come sniffing around. I cooked some of the meat, badly. Either rabbit is naturally dry and tough, or I overcooked it worrying about disease.

The rest of the animal and some of the bones boiled in a pot while Jim and I ate. He said something about rabbit stew being traditional, so it seemed like the thing to do. Though I was pretty sure that traditional American food didn't include rabbit of any kind. I didn't have any potatoes for the stew, but I guessed I could throw in the leftover rice and some canned vegetables in the morning. Crappy rabbit stew after crappy rabbit-and-rice.

I tried to hide my discontent from Jim, staying silent rather than do anything to make him unhappy. I didn't like that, changing me to suit him. But I didn't want him to kill me. Or to punish me.

We talked about food after dinner, estimating we had about a months' worth of supplies on us. More if Jim could hunt more meat. "What should I do if I see a deer or something near the cabin?" I asked. "Shoot it, try and kill it for something to eat?" That seemed wrong to me. Bad. Something my mother would ground me for. Sorry mom, but I'm willing to give up the old rules to eat something that fills me up. Even if it tasted bad. I wanted to live, and I was willing to kill to do it. Kill animals. A part of me wondered about Jim. Was I really that different?

He killed to live, too. He killed people, and look what he got in return. A cabin in some beautiful woods, remote and fairly safe. Food left behind by the people he killed, added to his own supplies. Even a shower and a working toilet, basic as they were. A young woman to fuck whenever he wanted. All he had to do was kill three people. Turns out I could kill bunnies for a full belly. Could I kill humans for a much greater reward? I didn't know.

Not knowing something so basic about myself scared me even more than Jim taking my hand, shaking me out of my reverie.

"Rita, baby. Did you hear me?" I shook my head no. "Look at me." Jim waited for my full attention. "Don't fire your gun around the cabin. It's dangerous. I don't care if a six-point buck walks right up to ya. Noise draws biters, an' gunshots carry. Hills an' echos'll probably confuse 'em, but don't take the chance.

"I've found a few spots out there, where a gunshot will draw out some that made it near the cabin, turn 'em away from you, an' where any biters that come at the noise will be turned around by steep ground. That's where I got the rabbit. But mostly I can't hunt. Gunshots is too risky. You understand?"

"Yeah." I nodded, convincing Jim I understood not to shoot at any animals. Which made me more dependent on him.

"'Sides, your little pea-shooter'll probably just hurt a deer, if it even gets close enough to hit." Almost as an afterthought, Jim said to himself, "I wish I had a bow."

We fiddled with the radio for awhile after dinner, trying to pick up a signal. Hints, maybe a whisper, probably just more static with the occasional electrical pop. After getting bored with the radio, Jim fiddled with me. He kissed me for awhile. After expressing frustration at my "dead fish" attitude, I went through some motions, and we made out.

When Jim started playing with my breasts, I protested. I knew where this was going. "No, please Jim. I'm sore. I'm still sore from last night."

"Your breasts are sore from last night?" Jim looked at me skeptically, feeling a lie.

But it was true. "Not my breasts... down there." I didn't even want to say vagina to him. The basic words felt dirty. They didn't before. Mom always taught me not to be ashamed of my body. She said only foolish Americans would be embarrassed of being a woman. She didn't really mean Americans, but I learned. Yet here I was. I didn't want to say vagina to my rapist.

"Come on, baby." Jim's hand massaged and played with one of my nipples. "I got some ideas. You're gonna love it."

"No, it'll... after last night, I'll..." I didn't know what to say, how to beg him not to rape me without making him angry at me. I could still hear the sound of his revolver, the sound of Jasper being murdered in the shower. "I'm still a little sore, it'll hurt if I'm still sore."

"Alright, Rita." Jim gave my nipple a quick twist, just enough to make be gasp. "You know, there are other ways to do it." Jim lifted his hand to my face and ran his finger along the edge of my lips, tracing the outline of my mouth. He stopped and gave out a wry laugh; the disgust I felt must have shown up on my face. "So innocent, so pure. So much I can teach you. We have time for it all, sweet Rita."

To my amazement, my protests worked. Jim stood up from the couch and went into the bedroom. He didn't even make me give him a blowjob. I wasn't an idiot, I knew what he meant. Though the thought of doing that with Jim made me gag. But he didn't make me suck his penis that night. He didn't want to think of himself as a rapist, I guess.

I sat on the couch for awhile, hoping Jim would fall asleep. Afraid that he would change his mind. Finally, tired, I joined him in bed. I wanted to sleep on the couch, but I felt certain that would anger him somehow.

We established something of a routine over the next few days, helped by the arrival of my period. Apparently bleeding from the vagina turned Jim off. Despite the difficulty of fashioning a make-shift pad with some rags stuffed into my underwear, I genuinely loved my period for possibly the first time in my life. I wished it would never go away.

Jim would leave in the morning for his romp though the woods. He became more and more familiar with the local hills, while I remained trapped and ignorant. In the evening he would return. I would feel useless and alone during the day, but I exercised and pretended to aim with my gun anyway. I also cleaned the cabin, and did all the chores around our little house. Jim didn't like to do "women's work".

In the evening we'd try out the radio, and talk. About food, about the biters, how the rest of the world might be doing. Sometimes Jim would tell me a story about his past, some long, drawn-out tale of rude country-club types or something boring that was supposed to be funny. I never talked about my past. I didn't want to share more with Jim than I had to.

After my period ended, I had to share my body again. Jim forced me to give him a blow job; apparently the idea had been running through his head for a few days. By forced, I don't me he punched me or tied me down. I made him pressure me, tried to tell him I wasn't interested without yelling no. But I didn't want to be attacked, and I really didn't want him to fuck me. So I gave him a blow job, though apparently not a good one. I thought I was following instructions, though maybe giving instructions is what made it "bad" for Jim. It was disgusting, yes. But what I hated more was Jim's continuing refusal to admit he was raping me, his continuing effort to make what he did part of some seduction fantasy where I learned to like it. Still, it was better for me not to force the violence that would dispel Jim's fantasy.

I even asked to try and do better at sucking his penis next time he forced sex on me. Giving good head became, perversely, a goal of mine. Not that I ever enjoyed what Jim and I did together. But if Jim ejaculated in my mouth, he wasn't coming in my vagina. And nothing scared me more than becoming pregnant in the woods with my rapist's baby.

A few weeks went by without much change in our routine. Big news was a change in our diet. Some fresh meat or starting to use some of the corn meal from the cabin's dwindling supplies. Two mornings, Jim had to kill a biter that wandered near the cabin during the night. Those were not pleasant days. Jim killed the biters with our axe, swinging it hard and burying it in their heads. It looked hard, both timing the strike and putting enough muscle into it. Made me feel vulnerable and question my own ability to do something like that. And I had to bury the bodies away from our water supply.

Once a biter appeared during the day and I hid in the cabin until Jim returned, rather than using my gun. That was what Jim said I was supposed to do. But I ended up wishing I tried the axe. Waiting for Jim to return and kill it meant being in fear for a long time.

Still, nothing genuinely new happened for a good three weeks. And then a family showed up.


	14. Southern Hospitality

Jim came running down through the trees in the morning, well after dawn, but still before noon. He surprised me, rushing down to where I was pumping water from the well. "Come on Rita, we gotta move!" Jim pulled me by the arm, rushing to the front of the cabin. I still barely comprehended what was happening. The suddenness of Jim's arrival had little to do with it. Our routine was so set that I couldn't believe he was here in the middle of the day.

"There's a group coming. Not sure how many." Jim opened the door, pulled us into the cabin. "I saw them first, made sure they didn't see me. But I had to circle around them to get here. We don't have much time." Tossing his axe into the corner of the room, Jim put the rifle he always carried on his back into his hands and prepared himself. "Get your gun." I already had my twenty-two on me, though it felt useless next to Jim's black military-looking rifle.

While I steadied myself, Jim broke the corner of our window with the muzzle of his rifle. He knelt on the couch and shifted until he felt comfortable with his firing position. We waited for several minutes. I stood in the sitting room, holding my twenty-two, feeling like I didn't belong. I examined Jim, wishing I could seem as ready as he was. The way he crouched, head low, just high enough to use his rifle's sights, most of his head hidden behind the gun itself. I could see the advantage. A tiny target, his body protected by the wall, ready to deal death to anything that came at the cabin's door.

Then I saw a girl, maybe ten years old, walk into view. She was maybe one hundred feet away, carrying two plastic bags that looked heavy for her. Raven-black hair gathered into a pony tail, a big smile lighting up a brown face dappled by sunlight filtered through the trees. My heart broke. She seemed so happy. Could anyone still be that happy?

Jim tensed up, aimed his gun at the girl, finger curling around his trigger. But he didn't fire. "Don't," I said, just in case. "She's just a little girl." The next person to appear was a woman. Tired, short. A red and tan dress with some tears and blood stains on one side. The woman carried a heavy backpack, looking too large for her small frame. She noticed the cabin, fear ran though her face, and I realized she wasn't a biter. The woman ran to the girl, grabbed her, and dragged the girl behind a tree.

The girl didn't yell out or make a noise, which struck me. Well-trained. A good scream is the last thing you needed if biters or other danger surrounded you. And she knew the woman. Her mother? The black, tangled hair fit. And the sun-darkened skin. "Don't kill them if we don't have to," I argued again.

"Soft woman," Jim muttered under his breath. "A family is going to want this cabin. A larger group is going to want our food. Of course there's going to be killing." At least Jim continued to wait. I suspected he wanted to see how many people were with the other group.

Two more figures appeared almost immediately. A boy, also carrying plastic bags, that looked a year or two younger than the girl. A brother. Then the father. Heavy-set; not carrying a pack. He had a metal baseball bat, though. The rest of the family carried what supplies they had. He fought any biters they met. The man had curly, shaggy hair. They weren't bothering with haircuts.

Jim and I waited. They couldn't know we were watching, not with the family in the light and the two of us in the darkness of the cabin. No one else came; the family stayed behind trees for the most part, probably discussing whether or not to look inside the cabin. Biters could be waiting. Or us. Finally, the father started towards us. I grimaced. Not the man. Not the one Jim was certain to kill.

Something snapped inside me. I wasn't going to be helpless; ignored by everyone while Jim murdered more people. I walked up to the cabin door. "Rita!" Then I ignored Jim's whispered exclamation, opened the door, and stepped outside. Raising my gun, I pointed it at the father.

"Stop. Don't move." The man stopped. "Put down the bat." He put down the bat. This was going better than expected. I heard Jim curse in the cabin, but he decided to continue covering me.

"How big is your group?" My questions were sharp, orders. Not friendly. That would make Jim happier. That made me less afraid.

"It's just my family. No group." So the man said.

"How many?"

"Four. Me, my wife, our two kids." The man didn't have an accent. Not an immigrant, then. Why did that matter?

"Weapons?" My pulse raced a little faster.

The father looked at me, wondering if I was stupid. "Just the bat." Then he relented, shrugging to acknowledge there was more. Losing his attitude, he simply explained. "Well, we have a six-shooter, a revolver, but we don't have any more ammo. A dozen geeks trapped us in a cow shed two nights ago. Killed 'em all, but we didn't have any bullets left. The guy seemed badass. His whole family lives this long? Kills biters a dozen at at time. Two days with nothing but a bat. Damn.

"We didn't mean to bother you. We're trying to get to Birmingham. Might have some family left there. We came up out of Atlanta on Highway 75. Heard from a cop that highway 20 was all kinds of bad. No gas, basically. We figured we could see if Fort Payne was still going, so we took the back roads west not too far from here. Ran out of gas this direction, too. After the geeks at the cow shed," the father shrugged, "we thought the woods would be safer. Didn't expect to get lost. Name's Jose. My wife's Miranda." The man waited for me to reply. When I didn't, he asked "what's your name?"

I didn't answer. Instead, I thought through what he said. He could be lying. But hell, he wasn't holding a gun. I lowered mine, and he relaxed. Jose waved to his family, and they emerged from the trees. The kids smiled at me. Miranda watched me warily and went to stand next to her husband. He put his arm around her. "Are you alone, miss?"

Jim barged out of the cabin, aiming his rifle at Jose's head. "She sure as fuck ain't!" I went to him, put my hands on him, tried to slow him down. He shrugged me off. "Check their damn packs!" Under his breath: "fool girl."

I went over to the family quickly, noting the angry looks on their faces. Jim had all the power here, and I knew I needed to diffuse the situation. "Put your backpack on the ground," I told the mother. Without waiting for her, I knelt down next to the children. They look frightened. Gently, I took their plastic bags away. Looking up at the mother, she hadn't moved. "Please!" I urged, whispering so Jim wouldn't hear. Jose squeezed her arm, and Miranda began taking off her backpack. Her hesitancy made me wonder if Jim planned on searching for weapons or robbing them. Maybe robbing them and murdering them. Shit. Would he really do that? In a heartbeat. Did he want to?

I looked through the first plastic bag after Miranda put her pack on the ground and stepped back from it. Mostly beanies, gloves and other warm clothing that was probably what the kids slept in. Jim yelled at me, interrupting me before I got to the second bag. "Do it right!" What the hell did that mean? Probably to be more mean about the search.

I dumped the clothing out of the plastic bag, so Jim could see what I looked through. Then I did the same with the next few. More clothing, and some pears they probably scavenged from a tree. The kids sniffed, trying not to cry. Miranda's pack held food and water. Jerky, energy bars, some candy, crackers, the empty six-shooter. Not a bad mix for traveling. Possibly valuable enough for Jim to hurt these people. Keeping my back to Jim, I pulled out some more water bottles. "Offer him some jerky," I hissed at the parents. Neither Miranda nor Jose moved. "Don't be stupid. Offer him some jerky, so I can make this something other than a robbery!"

Jose cleared his throat, as if he didn't already have Jim's attention. "We, uh, don't have much. But we've got some jerky. I think some local made it. Venison. Maybe you'd like some? It adds a little flavor to the day," Jose ended lamely.

I walked back over to Jim. "It's a nice day." I stayed quiet, almost pleading. "They have two beautiful children."

"Just some fucking beaners." Jim didn't talk loudly enough for the family to hear. I wondered how easy it was to read Jim's lips.

"Please? They can tell us about where they've been."

"Shit. Cover me." Jim waited for me to pull my gun and aim it at Jose. Then he slung his rifle around his back and pulled his revolver. "Okay," he said. I tucked my gun behind my belt again, using the hollow at the small of my back. I held Jim's left hand as we walked over to the family, hoping I could calm him.

"Take a seat," Jim invited, gruffly, gesturing at the clearing the family stood in. He knelt down while everyone else sat, keeping ready. At least he finally put his revolver away, and stopped pointing his gun at the family. Jim checked the empty revolver, then Jose cautiously picked up some of the food on the ground.

"I'm Rita," I said, even though I hated Rita. I hated who I was when I wore that name.

"Nice to meet you, Rita," Jose responded politely. "If you ask me, this is the best of the jerky. Nice smokey flavor, but not too strong." Jim grunted, and took a few strips. Jose kept his eyes on us, smiling a fake smile. Miranda gave each of the kids an energy bar. Thankfully they were well-behaved, or too scared to move much. Then the woman started slowly repacking their stuff.

"Have you, uh, been up here long?" Jose asked, awkwardly trying to start a conversation.

Jim just started Jose down, so I answered. "Awhile." I didn't give away any information, not wanting to potentially anger Jim. The gathering seemed so strange. It felt amazing to see new people, yet I remained so tense, wondering if the situation would explode. "Where have you guys been?" I kept my voice light-hearted. Just seeking friendly information. "I know so little about what's happening out there. No news, you know?"

"Well, do you want the whole story?" Jose asked. Miranda seemed content to watch carefully and let her husband remain the spokesperson.

"From the outbreak," Jim instructed.

"We used to live in Atlanta," Jose explained. "A little house next to Kindred Hospital in Atlanta. Before I even really know what was going on, the police came by, pounding on our door. They told us we had 30 minutes to evacuate, that everyone near the hospital had to leave. Then one of them just turned from the door and shot a man, gunned him down in the street. I don't even know if it's the first geek I saw or not."

"Biter," Jim corrected. I guess he wanted to stay in control.

"Biter," Jose chuckled grimly. "That's the truth of it. We were lucky it was Sunday and everyone was home. The police didn't even explain the shooting, so I wasn't going to argue. We put what we could in the car and drove off. The cops told us about a FEMA camp at Westview cemetery, told us there'd be a place for us there."

"A cemetery?" I asked, horrified.

"Flat ground," Miranda said, revealing a strong accent. Maybe that's why she seemed used to Jose acting as the spokesperson. "Hard to find a place without a lot of buildings in Atlanta."

"We stayed there for ten days," Jose said. "The national guard and the army moved into the city. CDC's there, you know." Jose took a deep breath, suppressing an unpleasant memory. "The flu ran through the east side of the city. There was gunfire all the time, night and day. But I didn't realize how bad it was until I heard artillery. Or tanks. Whatever it was, everything east of downtown turned into a war zone."

"They all left us," Miranda quietly remembered.

"They did," Jose said. "Most of the soldiers left the camp, which grew. They added facilities at Turner Field, and a golf course, but people just kept coming in. Government told everyone out in the country, where the fever was worse, to come to Atlanta. Packed us so tight we had to take shifts sleeping in the cots, three people to a bed. The soldiers went east, or got sick and died. Biters kept coming into the camp. Or rising in the camp. With no soldiers, we had to take care of them ourselves. We probably would have died there, but for Miranda."

"I didn't do nothing," Miranda said.

"She did," Jose disagreed. "She worked in one of the camp's kitchens. Kept our family fed when others started starving. She worked with this woman who grew up in Atlanta, Jacqui. She knew the score. The food stopped coming the same night they started dropping napalm. Mostly in east Atlanta, but also south of us. We figured the last of the soldiers would leave in a day or two, that the camp might be next. So we left first."

"Jacqui knew this place, a quarry. Wild spot, with some woods, not far. We made it there with some newcomers we warned away from the camp and a country sheriff. Stayed there a few weeks. Good water supply. Wood for a fire. Almost die every few days getting supplies from the city. Not that bad."

"We were stupid," Miranda said.

"How?" Jim asked.

"We though the quarry was safe," Jose explained. "It wasn't. Geek... biters like to roam. Big pack of 'em roamed right into our camp. Hell, they might've been from what was left of the refugee center. We lost a lot of people."

The girl sniffed, fighting back tears. "We lost Sophia. And Amy."

"Amy was one of the ones who died in the attack," Jose explained. "We left behind the rest of the group that afternoon. They wanted to go to the CDC. Morons." Jose shook his head in disbelief. "East Atlanta was where the worst problems were. Until everything went to shit. Even then I think the explosions drew a lot of the biters to the army, maybe even kept us safe at the quarry for awhile. If the army couldn't hold... hell, if the army turned. Well, we couldn't take our family there. Even if the CDC was up and running, no way the government risks taking in refugees. So we headed for Birmingham. Ended up here." Jose rubbed his thighs, relieving some of the stress that built up from the memories. "What about you? Where were you when it happened?"

"Not much to tell," Jim said before I could think about talking. "Lived in Cedar Bluff. People got the flu. Town caught on fire. We got out."

"Caught on fire," Jose remarked. "Not someplace we want to travel through, then?"

"No."

"Uh, where is Cedar Bluff?"

"Lake Weiss," Jim explained. Jose nodded, wise enough not to ask any more questions. "What were the roads like?" Jim wanted more information from the man.

"Messed up. Abandoned cars. Missing chunks, maybe from explosives. Small packs of biters in the way. A few times I just plowed through them." Jose grimaced. "Then we got through to Marietta, and a few someones took potshots at us. Gave us some nice bullet holes in the trunk. I don't even know where they were shooting from. Or why they wasted bullets on us. Then it just got weird. Outside of Cartersville we pulled to the side of the road to pee and a whole caravan of six trucks blew past us. Might have been a good thing they didn't stop to say hi. I saw a lot of guns. They went to the national forest, I think."

"Here?" I asked, worried.

"No," Jim explained.

"We checked four gas stations in Calhoun," Jose went on, "and on the way to where our car ran out. Two were empty. One had a swarm of biters. The other had people who gave us a warning shot."

"Sounds like there's still plenty of people," Jim said. "You'd think there'd be more on the radio."

"Sounds like there's plenty of people," Jose agreed. "There aren't. Handfuls left from thousands. I told you about every live body I saw since leaving the quarry. Most of the time, it's like everyone disappeared off the face of the earth. Empty. Eerie. If you're lucky."

"Embrujado," Miranda said. Whatever it meant, her face had a faraway look on it.

"I know this much," Jose offered. "It's safer with more people to watch while to sleep. Much better to have help. If you wanted to come with us. Either of you," Jose snuck a glance at me, unwisely, "you'd be welcome."

"No!" I exclaimed loudly, even before thinking about it. Jim stiffened, and I leaned into him, putting my hands on his chest and back. "The cabin's been good to us." I wanted to go with Jose badly. I think I wanted it more than anything else I'd ever wanted in life. But Jim wouldn't let me go. Without a doubt, he'd kill Jose if the man tried to take me from him. I was Jim's favorite property.

"We ain't goin' anywhere," Jim rumbled dangerously.

"Happy as two birds in a nest." I desperately tried to lighten the mood. I could still negotiate with him. I knew how. Play into his fantasy that I loved him. Be Rita. Pressing my breasts against Jim's side, I moved my hand on his chest suggestively. "But you know, these hills can be confusing. I bet my Jim could give you good directions to... well, to wherever's best for getting to Birmingham."

"I could go with you aways, make sure you're goin' in the right direction," Jim offered, unkindly.

"No," I cooed. I couldn't stand the thought of not knowing if Jim killed the family out of my sight. "We should have lunch together. You know these woods like the back of your hand. I'm sure Jose can follow your expert directions." Clumsy, but it worked. Jim reached behind me and squeezed my ass, hard. I blushed, embarrassed in front of the kids, and tried not to react.

Jim stood up, done with the conversation. Jose and I joined him. Miranda and the kids gathered the family's things. "One more thing," Jose said. "We did hear something on the radio leaving Atlanta. It was weak, but I think they were talking about some sort of sanctuary. We thought we might try and pick up the signal again after Birmingham. If Fort Payne doesn't work out."

"What frequency?" Jim asked.

"96.9 FM," Jose said.

"FM?" Jim sounded confused. "FM's short range. Why not use AM?" Jose just shrugged. "Well, thanks. We'll check it out." Jim paused, then gave me an order while watching Jose slowly pick up his bat. "Go inside the cabin, Rita. I'm looking forward to that lunch you promised me." I knew Jim wanted to give directions to Jose without me overhearing. Keeping me ignorant of the area around us was part of Jim's control over me.

I went to the cabin. As I reached the door it occurred to me that Jose was in front of Jim. Jim's back was to me, eyes glued to Jose and his bat. He couldn't watch us both at the same time. I could pull my gun without Jim seeing me. Pull it, kill him, and leave with Jose and his family. I stopped at the cabin door. Then I opened it and went inside, fighting back tears. Jose probably wouldn't let me come with him if I killed someone in front of his kids. I'd probably miss, and Jim would turn and kill me. I could miss, and Jim might murder Jose and his family.

I went to the window and watched Jim give directions to Jose. I watched the family whose lives I saved leave, and cried some more. Jim came back to the cabin and I went to the kitchen, wiping my tears away before he came inside. After checking to see I was really making lunch, Jim returned to the woods in front of the cabin, making sure Jose didn't double back.

We ate, then Jim took me outside to one of the nicer grassy clearings between the trees, pushed me to the ground, and fucked me hard. I paid for his mercy, saying "oh, yes" when I meant "stop, it hurts." I tried not to pay attention to his semen in me and I thanked him after. I hated myself for pleasing Jim. I hated myself for not killing Jim. I hated myself for being afraid. I tried to think about Miranda and her kids, but that didn't stop me from hating myself.


	15. An Evening By The Radio

Later that evening, we found the radio signal Jose told us about. 97.1 FM according to our radio, but it worked. Or at least it worked the second time we tried; we got nothing earlier in the day. And the signal only worked if we held the radio a certain way and added aluminium foil to the antenna. Jim and I both leaned in close, captivated by the words coming over the radio.

A careful, female voice addressed us. She spoke slowly, like a teacher explaining a difficult problem to a student. "Crossings to help guide you with your journey. Sanctuary for all, community for all. Those who arrive are greeted. Those who follow the rules, stay. Those who stay, survive. Terminus. Sanctuary for all. Community for all who wish to survive. Follow the rails to the point where all lines intersect. There are maps at the crossings to help guide you with your journey. Sanctuary for all, community for all. Those who arrive are greeted..."

The broadcast repeated, but it wasn't quite the same. "Not a recording," Jim said, "an actual person saying it over and over."

I nodded. "Better than a recording. Proof someone's alive wherever Terminus is. Wherever railroad tracks meet."

"Eh," Jim corrected, "proof someone alive is broadcasting about a railroad junction from somewhere. Don't have to be where they are." But despite Jim's doubts, we listened to the recording for almost an hour, enjoying yet another new voice after weeks of no one's company but our own.

Or at least, as far as I knew no one else's company. Paranoia struck me, and I wondered if Jim often talked to outsiders on his walks through the hills. No, he wasn't trusting enough to do that. Was he? I quieted the doubts, and listened to the end of the broadcast.

"Terminus." By this time, the woman's voice sounded a little heavier, a little more tired. "Sanctuary for all, community for all who wish to survive. Follow the rails to the point where all lines intersect. Our broadcast will resume tomorrow morning at 10 am and continue for one hour. Broadcast ends."

Silence spread through the cabin. Jim and I listened to that, too, before I spoke. "Could be good."

Doubtful, Jim disagreed. "Could be."

"Wasn't that the plan all along?" I asked, overtaken by a rush of daring and bravery. "Hide while the worst passes, then find a place where someone else did the hard work of setting up something that works."

"That's still the plan," Jim confirmed. "But what do we know about these people? Not a goddamn thing. We'll see what they say over the next week or so. See if they're still around after a week or so. Way I figured it, lotsa people are gonna set up their little places and kingdoms. We gotta find one that works for us, one that's strong enough to hold up long term."

I didn't like that "works for us" part. It sounded too much like "lets me keep owning you."

"But you know what?" Jim smiled, letting some cheer through. "Today was a good day. A good day. Met some people. Heard a nice lady on the radio." Jim pulled me into a hug and began kissing me. "And thanks to you, it's a great day." Oh, no.

I tried to push against Jim. "I still need to finish dinner."

Jim laughed at the silliness of the desperate excuse. "Chores can wait."

He made me straddle him this time, taught me to move up and down in certain ways. It felt dirtier than when he was on top, because I had to move. I had to pay attention. I had to look at him. It took everything I had to hide my hate, my loathing. I also had to hide my fear. Did I pay too much for the lives of Jose and Miranda's family? Were their kids worth it if he took me multiple times a day instead of once every few days? A tiny part of me said no, not if he stops going into the hills and leaving me at peace during the day. Not if I can never be clean of his filth. Then I remembered the little girl, thought of her dead. On the ground, chest destroyed by a rifle bullet. A second kind of shame washed through me as I smiled, and kept rocking. Kept pleasing Jim.

***

After our late dinner, we went to bed, where Jim decided to take me for a third time. After he finished and it slipped out, I turned on my side and traced the crack in the wall with my eyes. Jim put his arms around me, his chest to my back.

"Tell me about your family, Rita."

"Mmm?" What the hell? I didn't want to talk about my family with this asshole.

"I love you, girl. I love you. I want to know you. Know everything about you." I can say from experience, it really sucks when a rapist tells you he loves you. But I had to answer. I wracked my brain, struggling to remember anything I could about Native American Indians.

"They're probably all dead now." Jose and Miranda were lucky beyond belief.

Jim squeezed me harder, as if that would comfort me. "Our history matters, babe." Fine...

"We were poor, you know. Like everyone else on the reservation. Well, not the poorest of the poor, there were a few towns around us with less, but mostly we didn't have any money. Dad worked part-time at the local mini-mart. Mom made more, she was a secretary for some government agency or something." Not a single word was true. Jim didn't deserve the truth.

"Like the FBI?" From the sound of his voice, that would be bad.

"No, just some, uh, Indian agency thing on the reservation." Please don't ask me what the reservation was like; I've never been to a reservation.

"Any brothers and sisters?"

"One brother. Andy." Actually Arjun. "A year younger than me. Always a pain in the ass. I'm older, so I'm bigger and stronger, but he was always trying to prove how tough he was by getting at me. I usually felt bad for him, how insecure he was, even though he made me so mad sometimes I wished he never existed." I started crying. I couldn't help it. That was the truth, except for the name. And it hurt. I missed my little Arjun. "I always pushed him away. I can't remember if I told him I loved him."

I cried for a good long time, while Jim held me, stroked my hair, and told me it would be alright. I hated him for it. Hated him for it more than anything else he'd done to me. Hated he'd seen part of the real me. I wanted to kill him. I didn't want to shoot him. I wanted to tear out his eyes and gouge at his brain like I'd done to the corpse in the boat.

For a few days, I thought about killing Jim constantly. I thought about it when we ate. I thought about his bleeding corpse when I had my free time during the day. I luxuriated in the suffering of his demise while we listened to broadcasts from Terminus. He didn't even rape me for a few days and I never stopped thinking about killing him. But I still didn't want to die. I didn't know where we were, which way to civilization, and I wasn't sure I could take on your average corpse alone. Sure, if I killed Jim, I could take the rifles. But I didn't know how to use the bigger guns. What if it was harder than it looked? And I'd already proved that hitting a biter in the head with my twenty-two wasn't easy.

Sometimes, I'd see Jim sleeping, and realize I could do it right then. Just kill him. But I didn't. Instead, I'd cook, warn him about declining food reserves, get water from the pump, boil that water with wood I chopped, and pleasure him at least once every few days. Mostly after convincing him to do it in ways that wouldn't get me pregnant.

Once after Jose I asked Jim to teach me about woods stuff, about how to know where you're going in the wilderness. He looked at me, hiding something dangerous behind his eyes, smiled, and told me he was sure he didn't have anything to teach an Indian about the woods and the outdoors. Asshole. But an asshole that could kill me. I had to sleep too, and I didn't want to think about what Jim would do if he thought I was going to try and escape him. I didn't ask again.


	16. Wild Dogs

It took Jim two weeks to finally decide to go to Terminus. We spent a part of each evening listening to the Terminus broadcast. I stopped pressing him to plan for the outing fairly early on. If he laid plans, he didn't let me in on them. I made sure we always had two full packs well-stocked with supplies on hand, and kept up with my calisthenics. I knew it was only a matter of time; we didn't have much food left aside from what I kept ready for travel. After we ran out of hot sauce and had a nothing-but-rice-from-the -bottom-of-the-bag dinner, Jim's announcement that we'd leave in the morning came as no surprise.

And, of course, we headed for Terminus. The ham radio network Jim had expected to develop didn't pan out. People weren't broadcasting. Which meant they stayed on the move and couldn't carry equipment, they didn't have electricity, or they wanted to stay isolated from other people. Terminus at least had enough resources to feed a broadcaster and could spare a battery or two to run the radio. That's the best indication of prosperity Jim had, so that's where we went.

The hike down to what looked like a logging operation of some kind only took an hour and a half. I was pissed. I thought we were a lot more remote than that. Still, the path had been steep and winding, so I guess the cabin had been safe from wandering biters.

Jim gestured at what I guessed to be a portable office hut and a lumber mill with the rifle he carried in his hands. "Some people are probably living from one house to the next, or one building to the next, anyway. Nomads. Stupid. Can never tell which one will be a walker-infested trap, never have real security. A safe zone, that's what we need. Something with walls where you can sleep well at night." In addition to the gun in his hands, Jim carried the other rifle on his back, along with a backpack. I had a heavy hiking pack on my back, a small back-pack on my chest, and my twenty-two tucked into my pants. The weight was tiring me already, but Jim insisted he needed to be able to move in case he had to defend us. Jackass.

"A car with some gas would be nice, but we won't go charging into any houses for keys. Nosiree, better safe than sorry." Said the guy carrying only one pack.

I covered Jim while he checked the vehicles out in the open. It didn't take long. He stopped after two, cursing. "Some fuckin' cocksuckers siphoned off all the gas." Lovely. I didn't bother to respond. Instead, I simply waited for Jim to point in the direction I should start walking. He took us across the road. We passed through an orchard, carefully listening for any creeping walkers. We took a few fresh peaches for our trouble and then found ourselves back in undeveloped hills.

I stayed in something of a mood for most of that day. Now that the time I usually had to myself was gone, I realized how much I missed it. The amount of time I could spend with Jim before feeling angry, ashamed, or afraid was limited. But of course, the same survival math applied. Alone plus lost plus in the middle of nowhere plus biters equals dead dead dead.

Jim had more experience with the biters. Both killing them and, presumably, leading them away or at least figuring their movements. I didn't know what the hell I should be looking for. But then, even Jim seemed out of his element once we left his patrol zone.

It didn't matter. It didn't seem like we'd run into any biters. Around noon Jim led us onto a well-worn trail. "Sheee-it. We are where I thought we were. Camp Sidney-fuckin' Dew."

"Camp? Like a military camp?" I asked. Jim and I held differing opinions on whether running into soldiers would be a good thing. Jim thought they'd be the most dangerous people around. Desperate, possibly renegade, definitely willing to kill us to loot a backpack. I remained a bit more hopeful. Some violent jackasses served in the military, I knew. But so did my father, as good a man as you'd ever meet. Too bad he was dead in Estonia and not alive in Georgia.

No, I corrected myself. The army flew him back to Utah and he's with mom and Arjun in Zion national park where there's no zombies and everything is safe. I struggled to force that reality on myself while Jim laughed at the idea of Camp Sidney Dew being a military base.

"...oy Scouts taught me jack shit about being a man. Dumb as shit badges and faggoty instructors that the dumb kids thought were hot shit." Arjun wanted to be a boy scout when he was younger, but Mom and Dad wouldn't let him. There weren't any Hindu chapters in Salt Lake City, and Mom and Dad didn't want Arjun facing constant pressure to convert with one of the Mormon troops.

"I stayed at Camp Sidney Dew a few times," Jim continued. "Wouldn't call it camping. The boys all slept in this big bunk-house. The leaders had a few nice rooms in the same cabin that held the equipment. Piece of shit little camp. We should see the bunkhouse soon.

"A couple of empty fields, some lame-ass trails. Mostly farms and orchards nearby, though you could pretend you were in the wilderness if you tried." Yep, there was a big, boring looking building. And it was true, we hadn't gone through much woodland since our last abandoned field. "There's a shitty little lake hardly worth putting a boat in. Good times though. Not during the day, but at night we'd tell stories about Tommy-or-whoever-the-fuck who lost a leg when some farmer shot him for trespassing then sneak out and go steal stuff or break shit at the orchards nearby."

"Farmers shot some kid?" What the fuck was wrong with Georgia?

"Hell, I don't know," Jim snorted. "Probly not in real life."

We sat by the little dinky lake and ate lunch. Good sight-lines. I pulled out our supplies while Jim talked about our options.. Nothing as good as a ham sandwich. Jerkey, Granola, and powdered bean-meal mixed with water from the lake and a metallic-tasting purification tablet. "We can go east from here, to Calhoun. That's the closest town, an' it has a rail-line running through it. No big junctions, though. Or south. Rome's a little farther, but it's smaller and has a few junctions that might be Terminus. If they're not lyin' sumbitches, either place'll have a sign or two pointing the way. Wish we had an address, but smart. Don't give out too much info, so idiots who's still alive can't find 'em. Just capable folk." I didn't weigh in on how capable we were. "Awful quiet today, Rita. You got a notion on which way to go?" I didn't weigh in on that, either.

We splurged at the end of lunch, drinking a Powerade each. I disapproved, but if I didn't drink one when Jim cracked his open, he'd just appropriate it for himself later. I also saw my first biter in weeks. It did not look starving and about to fall over. I cannot describe how depressing that was. Solving the biter problem, if it could be solved, would take more than time. I watched it for a good while, wondering what weirdness brought a woman in a formal dress to Camp Sidney-fucking-Dew.

I don't know what she looked like before the end of the world, but dirt-black crazy hair, dirt or rot-blackened skin, and a tattered cream number with brown splotches from dead victims was not going on the cover of Vogue any time soon.

Once she got within sixty yards or so, Jim finished his Powerade and took aim. "Is a gunshot smart?" I asked. Jim also had our axe with him.

Jim didn't respond immediately, so I covered my ears while he killed the biter. One less ugly face in the world. One less face, period. "Maybe not. Might wake up the biters in our path. Might get them up and moving and out of our way. But it's noon, and I'm too full to want to swing the axe. Gets closer to night, an' we have to be more careful. Can't have biters converging on our camp. That's when gunshots could really fuck us over. Now? Who the fuck cares if a bunch of biters shows up. We ain't gonna be here."

Rather than make Jim a liar, we put on our packs and headed south.

We made good time in the afternoon, especially after finding a few bicycles in the driveway of a farm house not far south of the Boy Scout camp. We risked the open road, and found little trouble. A few biters lurched at us when we passed by three churches on Everett Springs Road. It's amazing how many tiny churches dot the landscape of rural Georgia. God didn't seem to have protected any of the congregations, though. I wondered about that church group on it's way to Birmingham, so long ago. Whether they made it or not. I held out more hope for Jose's family. They seemed tough, somehow. Probably more prepared for traveling than Jim and I.

We lost the bikes as evening fell. A slight downhill meant Jim could coast ahead of me at a decent clip. I went slower, less confident in my balance and a bit unnerved by how a patch of forest came right up to the road on both sides. Not a lot of room to react if something came at me.

Nothing came at me, but up ahead Jim shouted and I saw him go down, turning suddenly and making a great deal of noise. I braked, hard, and put my feet out in an attempt to stop, at the same time sucking in air and forcing down panic to focus on what was going on.

Two wolves came at Jim, hurt on the road, from both sides. No, not wolves. Dogs. A big, shaggy black dog that must have been a hundred pounds and an even bigger lion dog. Black face, golden coat. I knew someone that had a lion dog back in Salt Lake City. Supposedly, they were famous for being gentle animals.

This one didn't look gentle, going from an angry growl to a deep, terrifying bark. I pulled my gun as my bicycle clattered on the ground, trying to ignore the heavy packs I carried and keep an eye on the black dog while I aimed at the larger lion dog.

"Wait." Jim stopped me just before I pulled the trigger, coming to his knees and getting slowly to his feet. The dogs stepped from side to side, looking ready to pounce but not actually doing so. "Once they start barking, they're trying to run you off. They're not confident they can win the fight." Jim pulled himself up to his full height, spread his upraised arms, and shouted at the dogs.

"Yeaawww! Yeaawww!" It actually worked. The dogs backed away, still barking, before running off into the trees to our left. I breathed a sigh of relief, but still kept watch on that side of the road. I didn't trust my ears to catch them circling around behind us.

"I'm sorry. I should have shot them earlier. I wasn't sure I'd hit them, and..."

"Fuck no." Jim hunched over, feeling out his right knee. "A gunshot would have been stupid. Barking's bad enough, but shots really carry."

I felt like he hit me, which actually was stupid. I try to help him and he insults my intelligence? He'd have been more pissed if I sat there and watched the dogs attack him. Oh, sorry, couldn't help. Didn't want to make the noise! Still I burned with shame. Not because Jim said I was stupid. Because I let it affect me. How could I allow a man I hated to rebuke me like that, to hurt me with just words? I felt weak all over again. Afraid.

Checking his bicycle, Jim discovered his front tire too bent to continue riding. "Fucking bitches!" He laughed, summoning a tiny bit of cheer, confusing me. Oh, right. Female dogs. Haha. "How's your bike."

"Back tire's already flat."

"Well, shit. Let's go eat."

Dinner actually came about a half an hour later, when we could sit in a pumpkin field. Pumpkin vines don't grow very high, letting us watch out for biters. The pumpkins were large, some already overripe and rotting. Halloween came and went with no carving.

After filling our bellies, we continued. With daylight beginning to fade, Jim explained we needed to find a structure to hole up in. Preferably a shack, or a garage. Something easily searched that would still keep us hidden and our smell enclosed.

Not much later we looked at small house with a yard full of weeds and a small river behind it. Not a trailer, but not much larger than one either. "Wouldn't take long to search it," I said. "A lot of clear ground around it. Safer in the morning." I meant we'd be able to easily check for biters when the sun came up, without having to worry about something near one of the exits hiding behind a tree. As I encouraged Jim, I prepared to pull my gun. My hand still shook; small tremors from our encounter with the dogs. I don't know why that scared me so much. Maybe the loudness of the barking. Maybe seeing loving, gentle pets transform into vicious killers. Was anything good still left in the world?

"I'ma break that little window, open the door from the inside," Jim instructed. "I'll clear out anything ahead of us with my axe. Don't use your gun. Your job is to keep watch behind me. Make sure nothing takes me from behind. Look out the window. Call out any biters. Any men, too. Hell, any dogs. I don't want somethin' trappin' us in there."

"Got it." I looked at the weeds in the yard around us, wondering if biters ever crawled or could somehow hide in tall grass. Maybe I should be more careful when walking through fields. Jim broke the house's window, opened the door, and I followed Jim in, scanning for enemies outside one last time before stepping through the doorway. I pulled my gun, keeping its reassuring weight in my hands. Jim had his axe. I didn't care what he said, I wasn't walking into an enclosed space without a weapon.

After clearing the main room, kitchen, and a tiny bedroom, Jim walked into the short hallway on the far side of the house. Ignoring the bathroom, he took a deep breath before swiftly opening the door to the last bedroom in the house and stepping inside it, axe at the ready.

I double-checked the main room, checked out the windows, and looked back down the hallway, expecting to see Jim confirm he cleared the second bedroom. I didn't see Jim. I saw an open bathroom door and a biter staring right at me. Large, male. It raised an arm in my direction and stepped forward. I pulled the trigger, determined to hold my ground. I would not let this one get me. "Heeyyyy," it moaned, before indoor gunshots shattered the air. Despite the pain in my head, I felt a surge of strength and confidence when the biter crumpled to the floor.

Jim crashed into the hallway from the bedroom. The bathroom door didn't want to close in the tight hallway; Jim shoved it and knocked the biter's head out of the way. I lowered my gun, so I didn't put Jim in the line of fire. The biter let out a tiny whimpering cry of pain. What the hell? Jim and I both looked down at it.

I stared at the biter. Jim looked at it for only a second before looking back at me. "Fucking moron!" he yelled, and then I knew. Gods... Gods... "I fucking told you not to use the fucking gun!" I didn't hear Jim. I knelt down next to the body. Its eyes looked back, filled with pain. The body wasn't rotting. It smelled of shit and cologne, but not death and decay. I shot it in the neck, the chest, and one glancing blow to the temple.

"Why?" The man I killed asked, the question a whisper, eyes glazed with pain boring into my soul. Then he coughed, blood ran from the corner of his mouth, his eyes closed, and Jim pulled me to my feet, packs and all.

"Stupid bitch!" Jim took my gun away, then grabbed my neck. "Move you fucking cow!" He pushed me out of the house. I got my bearings, packs heavy, and saw a biter come out of the trees across the yard. It saw us, hungry. Jim and I started to run. Not in a panic. A good run. Adrenaline and fear helped.

In no time we ran up the house's driveway to the road. A biter stood in our path until Jim split her skull open with his axe. Jim avoided the orchard directly across from us, making for the farm house instead and its open yard. I followed him, too busy for horror to wash over me.

More figures stepped out of the farm houses, only shadows in the dying light. We kept running. Through the yard, into the wild lands behind it. Avoid the marsh, note the tree-covered hillside in front of us. Jim led us through a stream bed, then we scrambled up a short but steep embankment. Adrenaline began to fail. Jim pushed us a little further, and then I fell to the ground, spent.

Packs were too heavy. Breath, gone. Adrenaline got me this far. I couldn't go farther. Jim seemed ready to stop, too. We both hoped any biters following us would continue on a straight path, following the stream instead of following us up the hill.

After sucking in air, I struggled to sit up. Trembling, weak muscles lifted my packs off my shoulders and I discovered I could stand. Jim, already recovered, loomed above me. Fury consumed him, obvious even the darkness of the last bit of dusk.

Maintaining the presence of mind to be quiet, Jim hissed in anger at me: "Idiot woman! Why would you do that?" Why? Oh gods, what did I do? I killed a... a biter.

A man. I couldn't lie to myself. I murdered that man. Shame swept through me, new and raw. Not the hate for myself when I couldn't kill Jim. Not the disgust for myself when I pleasured him. The shame of fear. Fear for what else I'd destroy. I am terrible; something to run and hide from. A murderer. Bringing death and evil and dread to the world. Like Jim.

"If tonight's my last night on Earth, God help me I'm..." Jim didn't finish the threat. He shoved me down to the ground, pulled off my shoes and my pants, and turned me onto my stomach. I didn't protest. I lay there, believing I deserved it. Face in the dirt, I kept in my cries. Cries of pain, cries of guilt and shame, both must be stifled. Biters could hear.

Jim fucked me hard, shoving my head down with one hand while he pulled my hips to him with another. My knees bloodied themselves on the hard ground, even without much weight on them. I had to strain to keep my face from the same treatment. The rhythm of Jim's weight crashing into me, the violent rhythm of his penis forcing open my dry vagina, both matched the rhythm of my own shame. I deserved Jim's punishment like the one I meted out on myself. You murdered him! You murdered him! You murdered him! You murdered him!

At least I didn't die.

Jim broke the rhythm with his final thrust, shoving me fully into the forest floor. My face ground into the dirt. I didn't want to die. No! More! I wanted to live.

My naked vulnerability matched the naked vulnerability of being in the woods at night. We would sleep here, and hope not to die. I felt Jim's last spurt, his semen deep in my ravished vagina, and I realized how dangerous his lust was; his stupidity. He risked my life many times over to take the easy way out and make himself feel better.

Jim was afraid. So he took the man's way out. The easy way out. He could beat me, demean me, rape me, and feel powerful and dominant and no longer afraid. Easy. Weak. Women didn't have that luxury. I didn't have that luxury. Jim basked in the glory of seeding me and I counted the ways he risked my life to help him feel better and ignore his problems.

He risked my life by giving biters a chance to find us and bite me while he ground my body into the dirt.

He risked my life by giving biters a chance to find us and bite him, leaving me alone, lost in the woods at night, and probably dead.

He risked my life by violently raping me. Better rush of power for him, but if he seriously injured a knee, not hard on uneven ground in the dark, I might be unable to run tomorrow.

He risked my life by ejaculating in me. He didn't know my period was already several days late. Maybe I was already pregnant, maybe not. But if this kept up, I would be. Which would probably mean my death.

Jim was dangerous. And not as smart as Jasper thought he was. He laid on me, softening, and I resolved to kill him. Calm came over me, certainty. Thinking about killing Jim no longer filled me with angst. Resolve swept aside doubt and agitation. Next time other were around, like Jose's family, I would not hesitate. Earlier. Next time Jim cleared a house for the night and I didn't need his muscles to swing the axe and take down a biter, I'd murder him. In self-defense. I wanted to live. A much firmer motivation. A much colder motivation than lust for vengeance. And not just Jim. This feeling was new. Would I kill anyone to stay alive? Strangers? Yes.

Murder seeped into me, replacing the shame leaking out of me. I became comfortable with murder. I murder people when they put me in danger. I murder people if it keeps me alive. The man in his little house was a fool. Surprised, sick, whatever. I thought I was in danger. Killing to get out of danger, I was comfortable with that now. I should be more careful about identifying biters and humans, yes. But damn the gods I didn't really believe in. Damn the death that comes for us all. I wanted to live a while longer. I was willing to murder to do it.


	17. Rome Didn't Fall In A Day

Jim's weakness failed to kill us; no biters found us during the night. We woke up with the sun. I felt sore. Dirty scabs covered the cuts on my knees, and I hoped I didn't have an infection. Jim seemed cautiously optimistic, despite his warning not to do "any more fuckin' stupid shit."

We pulled some food out of our packs, ate, I made a mental note to keep an eye out for alcohol to use as disinfectant, and we set off. Jim guided us towards the same small river we saw the other day, behind the house where I murdered a man. I questioned the wisdom of going back to an area we knew had biters, but Jim just told me we'd end up at a different part of the riverbank and then proceeded to ignore me.

It took a few hours of walking, and one biter took an axe to the head, but Jim did guide us to an unfamiliar part of the river. The Oostanula. I tried to say the name four times and still couldn't pronounce it right. We picked our way through the brush alongside the river. Not easy terrain, but eventually we crossed a road and then found a shed with a trail leading to the water.

Jim swung the axe a few times, broke open the shed, and we found ourselves proud owners of a canoe and some fishing gear. After we carried it down to the river and loaded our packs into it, I asked for an update on the plan: "why are we getting back on the river?"

"The Oostanaula runs through Rome. I ain't gonna get trapped in some alleyway by fifty biters. River means we always got a way out, an' we can check the rail lines where they're next to the river." I could think of plenty of ways we could be trapped on the river, but I didn't have a better plan, so I sat down in the front of the canoe while Jim sat in the back and began paddling.

The rest of the morning passed peacefully. Jim paddled downstream, but the Oostanaula wasn't exactly a fast-moving river. It wasn't until shortly after an early lunch that we saw the outskirts of Rome.

After coming out from under an overpass, a strange sight appeared on the left bank: a small forest of smudged aluminium supports, some fallen and bent, most standing straight, like the skeletons of small buildings. I couldn't make heads or tails of it.

Reluctantly, I asked Jim. "What is all that?"

Jim shrugged. "Looks like someone started setting up dozens of big tents, then just stopped."

"Maybe the coverings blew away?"

"Or burnt away." Jim frowned in thought. "I think we're by State Mutual Stadium. Minor leagues. It was a nice stadium. Pretty new."

"Could've been a FEMA camp," Jim continued, "or refugees fleeing the city."

"Mmmm," I grunted. "Guess it's time to be quiet." Jim nodded in agreement.

The river swung through a long bend. Around the stadium, I guess. All we could see was the river and trees on both sides. Until we floated under another overpass. On the right bank I could still make out patches of marsh through a screen of trees along the edge of the river. On the left bank, grey, death, and destruction.

Five tanks dominated the landscape. Massive metal death machines. Dead, the remnants of a defeated people. One, only fifty yards away, looked ready to be swept away by the river. Only its turret remained fully out of the water, the barrel pointed towards us yet utterly unthreatening. The tank closest to us rested at a strange angle, nearly on its side. It, too, was buried in muck. Not as deep, but it was clearly sinking into the mud. Not visibly, but when it stopped or perhaps over weeks the earth gave way and prepared to swallow the machine up.

Two more of the war machines stood further back. One looked more or less untouched, aside from soot and ash coating its surface. The other seemed to have been hit by one of its brothers, torn and twisted metal guarding an exposed interior. The broken turret leaned against the ruined shell of the destroyed vehicle, helping to set the scene for the charred remnants of a fast food outlet behind the once-wild area and the two tanks.

Scattered about what must have once been a wooded green-zone along the river, the dead machines distracted the eye from the scene around them. But death must eventually be faced. The few trees that remained standing were only charred corpses. Ash and grey mud covered everything, drowing out color. Biters twitched, still moving though few still stood. Worse were the mounds. Brush, natural hills that no longer looked right? Bones littered most of the mounds, especially the one the last tank stood in. It seemed to have stopped in the middle of driving through a pile of what must have been corpses. Or perhaps a mass grave in small rise? Or perhaps a mountian of corpse-ash fueled by the constant addition of more and more dead people.

When the smell hit, of fire and dryness, of rot and something worse, Jim leaned over the canoe and vomited. My own control faded, and I also rushed to the edge of the canoe and gave up my breakfast. It took Jim a few minutes to recover. He didn't speak directly to me. Instead, he began weakly paddling, in order to get us away from it sooner. "Jesus titty-fucking Christ," he whispered to himself.

Strangely, Jim's vulgarity broke the spell of the charnal field. I focused instead on what little of the city I could see. Beyond the charnal field, through a light haze of dust and corpse ash, was the burnt remenant of some big building. A big box store or a warehouse, from the looks of it. At the southern tip of the charnal field, the road came near the river and three similarly burnt and ruined government buildings came into view. One of the sported a brass Social Security logo.

All those tea-party nutjobs were right, in the end. They wouldn't live to collect Social Security.

South of the government buildings stood a strange, manicured park. The grass still seemed relatively short, trees were spaced appropriate distances from each other, and picnic tables awaited family reunions. Occasional patches of ash gave the lie to the mirage, but I still longed for sit in the grass eating watermelon.

Passing under another small overpass led us into a housing development. This overpass wasn't a road. Railroad tracks passed over our heads. Jim picked up his paddling, keeping us closer to the left bank due to a few wandering biters testing the water on the right bank. The last residents who wouldn't leave their homes? They seemed like a good reason not to get out and look for signs leading us to Terminus.

An Olive Garden, Starbucks, and a larger overpass marked our entrance to what passed for Rome's downtown. Or what once passed for Rome's downtown. I saw few signs of fire compared to the charnal field farther north. Surprising, given the war zone that confronted us.

Chunks of the taller buildings were missing, the jagged edges of the three-story buildings appearing as if someone placed bombs on their roofs and exploded them. Every structure, small and large, wore the pockmarks of military rifle fire. Corpses of biters, soldiers, people, lay scattered about. Not in large quantities, and none moving, but enough to emphasize no one bothered to clean up after the fighting.

Four bridges once crossed the Oostanula River, two pedestrian bridges and two roads. Only one of the roads still passed over the water, and chunk missing from it reduced it to one lane. The others dropped into the water where explosions or something destroyed them. The canoe felt less safe, as if falling out might impale me on sharp, twisted metal.

Only the soft water sounds made by the canoe's passage and the distant cry of crows disturbed the silence. That seemed worse that the sight of the city itself. At the least, sad, sorrowful music should be playing. Or something tense, expectant, to warn us to watch for hidden dangers. But this wasn't a movie, and nothing softened the ugliness or told us what would come next.

The Oostanula and another small river merged. The downtown war zones lay on either side of the Oostanula, while the smaller river and the merged stream separated both of the downtown area from the far bank. Jim brought us into some trees on the far bank. I got out of the bow without asking and looped a rope around a tree, but I didn't tie a knot. Enough to keep rising water from making off with our escape route, but no knot meant we could leave in a hurry if needed.

"Leave your stuff in the canoe," Jim instructed. "We should be light on our feet." He readied his favorite rifle, the 'AR-15'. I pulled out my twenty-two, wishing had been willing to instruct me on the use of his other rifle back at the cabin. More firepower would feel better right now.

We emerged from the river bank and found ourselves in a cemetary, thankfully absent of walking corpses. The bones in the ground seemed content to stay there. Once on open ground, Jim led us on a path parallel to the river bank. "The railroad is upstream from here," he said by way of explanation.

At the other end of the cemetary, a road went east across a bridge to the downtown area or west past an apartment block into a nice, tree-lined neighborhood. Strangely, everything looked fairly clean. No biters bothered us. Good thing, too. Jim and I stood captivated by a beautiful sight across the river.

"That's a granary," I said. Not as tall or as nice of a paint job as the Mormon granary at Welfare Square, but I knew grain silos when I saw them.

"That's a granary that ain't blowed up," Jim corrected.

"Across the river, then?"

"Mmm-hmm."

We walked down the middle of 'Broad Street'. The Broad Stret bridge to the downtown area and, on the edge of the business district, the granary and its associated factory, did not have the same clean look as Broad Street did next to the cemetary. A couple of corpses wearing army fatigues lay on the bridge next to scattered equipment. One of them had a patch that clearly said "U.S. Army Chemical Corps". Jim read the same patch and shivered.

"What are those?" I asked, pointed to two strange tripods with two small legs and one long tube for a leg.

"Mortar tubes." We walked most of the way across the bridge until Jim stopped right next to the last corpse and raised his hands.

"What's going..."

"Stop moving!" Jim ordered. I heard fear in his voice.

"Why?" I asked, confused. I raised my pistol and scanned for threats, but I didn't see any.

"Lower your gun," Jim urged. "Then look at the ground, a few feet in front of you."

"Oh." A bright green dot, like one from a laser pointer, grabbed my attention as it moved towards me, up my body, and stopped in the middle of my chest. I lowered my gun.

"That's far enough," squawked a voice from the ground. "You with the rifle. Take out your clip, empty the chamber and then you can pick up the radio from the ground." Jim did as the voice instructed, stuffing his rifle's ammunition in one of his pockets. Then he slowly bent down and carefully grapped the radio on the rotting corpse.

Jim pressed the radio's send button. "Who is this?"

"Honey," the hidden woman said over the radio. "You're the one with a sniper rifle pointed at your chest." Or at least a laser pointer, I reasoned. "You get to tell me who you are and what you're doing here first."

"Name's Steve," said Jim. I couldn't work out why he lied. "My girl and I are trying to find a place named Terminus. We'd appreciate any confirmation you might have as to whether or not it really exists."

"That's nice for you. How many in your group?"

"Just the two of us, ma'am." Ma'am. Isn't Jim just the nicest guy?

"Hmm," the woman grunted, not sounding convinced. "Why are you on the road? Most folks looking for Terminus come along the railroad tracks."

"We came into town from the north," Jim explained. 'Seemed safer to take a canoe along the river. We were going to get out where the tracks cross the Oostanula, but we saw biters and didn't feel like fighting."

"Biters? You mean dead ones?" The woman asked.

"Yes, ma'am."

"And what about the girl, does she speak?"

Jim answered for me. "She's healthy. And she's with me. I've been keeping us alive, guided us here..."

"Put her on."

Jim shot me a look I couldn't interpret, then gestured for me to bend down and speak into the microphone. "Hello? I'd really like to join you. Even if you're not with Terminus. It's hard being alone." I put my right hand on my gun without really noticing it. I was so close to being rid of Jim.

"Well isn't that sweet. We offer sanctuary for all, blah, blah. It's true, but we're not saps. When both of you take the ammunition out of your guns, all of your guns, you can finish crossing the bridge and then turn south."

Jim and I did as we were told, though I felt a sense of dread as I emptied my twenty-two. I was making a mistake somehow. I knew it in my bones. After emptying our weapons, Jim and I started across the bridge again. As we left the corpse, the radio came on one more time.

"No muss, no fuss. You follow instructions well; that's a good beginning. Welcome to Terminus. My name is Mary."


	18. Terminus

After crossing the bridge, we met two men who could have been twins. Short, fast types. Black, young, wearing baggy clothing that somehow looked pre-apocalypse. I guess it just looked clean and new. One of them directed Jim and I to sit at the edge of the asphalt apron around the granary and wait. We did. Jim was smart enough not to say something blatantly racist.

After a moment I remembered Buffington Island, surprising myself. That seemed like a lifetime ago. Jim had the ability to act normally around people, like he did on Buffington Island. He was smart enough to hide how evil he was.

The two men worked steadily. There was a seriousness to them that didn't quite match their clothes. They went inside the granary with an empty, industrial plastic sack, then emerged with what looked like a ten or twenty-pound sack of grain all sewn up at both ends. Then they loaded that sack onto a small trailer. The kind that looked like it belonged on the back of a four-wheeler. Except there wasn't a four-wheeler attached to it. Then the men grabbed another empty sack and went back inside the granary. It didn't take long for the trailer to be filled with grain. Food. I was hungry after watching the men carry food back and forth. Mostly because I couldn't stop fantasizing about eating it.

With the trailer full, Mary came down from the scaffolding on the side of the granary. She seemed to be in her thirties or forties, with pale skin and dark hair. Stocky, but strong. And she moved precisely, every motion calculated. She thumbed her laser-pointer on and put a green dot on my chest, then Jim's, grinning widely. Jim looked angry, which was the funniest thing I'd seen in a good long time, so I laughed loudly. It's not like Mary had been bluffing. She also carried a military rifle slung over her shoulder. The men had pistols. And our guns were on the bed of the trailer, buried under sacks of grain.

Mary spoke, her voice confirming that this woman was the one who had talked to us over the radio. “I see you've met JJ already,”

The two men gave Mary identical annoyed looks, effectively interrupting her. They could be twins, moving identically, getting annoyed identically, except that their faces were so different I was sure they weren't related. They had the same dark tone, but one had a round face with a broad nose and the other had a longer face with a narrow nose.

“I'm Jamal,” said the one with the round face and broad nose.

“I'm Jacob,” said the one with the long face and narrow nose. They even sounded alike.

“And this is Mary,” they both said. And then they saluted her. She ignored them.

She pointed at Jim. “Steve?” Jim nodded.

Mary pointed at me. “And you are?”

“That's Rita,” Jim said.

“That's not my name!” I yelled. Jim looked shocked. I'd never told him my full name. Amrita. The girl who was happy, who once had a family, who could make decisions on her own. Rita was the mask. The face I put on because Jim was racist. The body that he raped. “And he's not,!”

“Shhh. Hush now, Amrita.” Mary didn't pronounce my name quite right, but she tried. Somehow she had a strong enough presence to stop me from telling her Jim wasn't Steve, wasn't a good man, all the things I wanted to say. Jim started at me, surprised but calculating. “We have a good talk with everyone we meet before we let them into Terminus. No point in repeating yourselves. I don't have the final say on who gets into Terminus. Unfortunately.” She gave us another big grin.

“Now we need to keep an eye on both of you until we get to know you,” Mary continued. “So Steve, I need you to pull the cart. We rigged up a nice handle connected to the hitch. Amrita, you walk behind it. Help push if the cart needs it. It's not too far to Terminus.” Jim pulled the cart. I helped push it. JJ flanked us to either side, keeping at least ten feet away from the cart, while Mary followed, covering us with the rifle and giving directions.

A few minutes into what did turn out to be a pretty short walk, Jim started to ask a question, only to be interrupted by Mary. “Why don't we live in the granary? JJ both asked the same question when they claimed sanctuary. That much grain creates a lot of dust. It ain't healthy, breathing in little bits of wheat and rice and whatnot. And Terminus is better set up for people than the bread factory. More bathrooms, places to sleep.

“Better security, too. A lot of buildings are on other side of the silos. Dead ones can get up close without being seen. Men, too. And of course, when we started Terminus the 224th was still trying to hold against a huge wave of roamers and a scavenger militia. Fighting a two-front battle. Not that we were any better. The militia nutsos just wanted control of the granary, same as us. Our orders came from the battalion commander, not headquarters. We just wanted to hold onto the food. We failed. Roamers are common in the city. But at Terminus we have a fence. More importantly, we have open sight lines. Even more important than that, we have live bodies. People. Good people, like JJ here.” Jamal and Jacob nodded at us.

Soon we stopped near a chain-link fence. A large building that looked like a combination old-fashioned train station and train-repair facility stood in the middle of a large clearing. Behind that was an old warehouse. Several box cars sat on and off the rails, spray pained with various letters. While Mary opened a gate in the fence, JJ watched us and people started exiting the Terminus building, shielding their eyes from the sun. Several gave us friendly waves.

“JJ, go ahead and take the cart over to box C. After the meet and greet, you can load the wheat in the boxcar. But take the rice directly to the kitchen.” Mary led us over to the group, maybe thirty people in all. Two skinny white guys stood in front of the rest. At least one sentry stood on the rail station's roof, keeping watch. Probably more outside of my field of vision. “Everyone, this is Steve and Amrita.”

“Hello Steve!,” they all said at once. “Hello, Amrita!”

“I'm Mary, and I'm a recovering alcoholic. Only 'cause there ain't no booze to be had.” The crowd gave Mary a few chuckles. I had the feeling it wasn't the first time she told that joke. “This is Gareth. And this is Martin.” Martin graced us with a theatrical bow, only slightly ruined by the baseball cap on his head. “You can meet everyone else later.”

“Newcomers have to tell us how they got here,” Gareth told us, businesslike. Something about him reminded me of Mary. I wondered if they were related. “Sanctuary for all, but we wanna make sure you didn't piss another group off, that kind of thing.”

“Name's Steve,” Jim said. I still didn't get why he was using a fake name. Seemed pointless. Plus he could get caught if someone he knew showed up at Terminus. “Grew up here an; there along the border. Settled down in Atlanta. We been hidin' in a basement for damn near forever, till the food storage ran out. Amrita here's my neighbor's kid. I took her I...”

“LIAR!” I yelled as loud as I could. “He's a liar and a murderer and a rapist!” Jim looked shocked. “His name isn't Steve, it's Jim. He's not from Atlanta, he's from Cedar Bluff.” The words rushed out of me, crowding together. I barely took time to suck in more air to get my story out. “My plane crashed and Jasper rescued me, and I hid, then we escaped. And Jasper was my friend, but Jim killed him! Murdered him just like he murdered the people who owned the cabin we took. He murdered him because he wanted me to himself. He raped me, over and over! He could do it because he knew I'd die without him.” Mary tried to get a word in edgewise, but I just kept going. “We stayed in that cabin 'til we ran out of food and that's the only reason we left. He's a liar and a murderer and a racist, and he's no good. You gotta kill him! You gotta kill him for everything he's done!”

I ran out of breath, which gave Jim a chance to speak. He certainly had everyone's attention. To my surprise, he didn't start with a denial. “She's scared,” he said in a soft voice. “She killed a man yesterday. I tried to stop her, but I didn't get to her in time. She didn't mean to, of course. Thought he was a biter. It's OK, Rita. These people will understand you don't mean it.” Jim turned to face the crowd directly. “She must have wanted you to send me away so you wouldn't find out.”

The Terminus people started talking to their neighbors, commenting on the gossip, watching me. I was struck with fear. I didn't know what I'd do if they threw me out. What if they threw both of us out. Jim would kill me. Or worse.

“Quiet!” Mary snapped at the crowd. She put her arm around my shoulders, and asked me softly. “Is this true?”

“I didn't do it. I didn't kill him.” Mary waited. “I didn't mean to,” I confessed, not sure what to do. “He looked like a biter. And he came at me, he didn't say anything. I didn't know,” I ended with a whisper.

“It was an accident,” Mary reassured me. “We'll have to talk about it. But it wouldn't be the first accident. Now, how did you meet Steve?”

“Like I said, she's my neighbor's kid,” Jim said.

“Lair! MURDERER! I've never been to Atlanta.” I lunged at Jim, mindlessly attacking.

Mary caught me by the arm and pulled, hard. “Shut up, child! Let him speak.”

“You heard her lie to you. Try to deny killing that innocent man yesterday. Killt him in cold blood. She's always been like that. Lies without thinking.”

“No! You have to KILL him!” The Terminus crowed looked at me with alarm now, disturbed by my bloodlust. “He raped me. He murdered Jim.” I started crying, They weren't going to help me. Why? Was it because I was a girl? Was this my punishment for killing that man? I felt so helpless. I finally found someone else and I wasn't going to get away. They were going to let Jim in and let me die to the biters. “I'm still bruised from last night, and they won't believe me,” I whispered to myself.

But Mary heard me. “What?” She asked me suddenly. “Quiet,” she interrupted Gareth and Jim. “You're bruised where, hon.” The crowd became silent, listening intently. “Where are the bruises?”

My mind wasn't working, my emotions were overwhelming my ability to weigh the situation. “My knees. And my... my butt. Last night he pushed me on my knees and...” Tears were flowing down my cheeks. I felt so ashamed. Ashamed to tell everyone. Ashamed I hadn't killed Jim already. “I think I might be pregnant. He does it a lot. I can show you the bruises.”

There was a commotion from the crowd. Motherfucker! God damn pedophile! You better run!

Run? I looked up through my tears and saw Jim running. “No!” I grabbed for my .22, but it wasn't there. “He has to die!” I squirmed out of Mary's arms and lunged for Gareth's gun. I almost had it. I touched it. But he noticed in time and stopped me, grabbing me by the wrists and pulling me down. He squatted to bring himself face to face with me and tried to make eye contact while I struggled, trying to get as his gun.

“We don't kill people if we don't have to,” Gareth told me. As if I was a child.

“I don't know. Good a time as any to see if she's a good shot,” Martin joked.

“We don't kill people if we don't have to,” Gareth told Martin, firmly.

I still couldn't get at Gareth's gun. Finally I stopped struggling, dropped to my bruised knees and watched Jim disappear into the treeline.

I never saw Jim again. He's probably dead. Maybe he's not. I'm still angry I wasn't the one to kill him.


	19. A Quick Trip Down The Street

The Terminians. Yes, they really use that name. The Terminians didn't know what to do with me. I was an admitted killer. But I was also the victim of a racist asshole. Being kind people, they took me in. But they kept a close watch on me, and never trusted me to do anything important. That part wasn't new.

Someone else cooking for me and feeding me dinner, now that was knew. Being able to cry, out loud, was new, too. I didn't have to pretend for Jim. I spend the whole first night crying. Crying about everything that happened over the past month. Crying about Jasper. Crying about Jim getting away. Which worked out well: the Terminians gave me a closet that doubled as my own room. I felt spoiled.

I also felt alone. No one knew how to talk to me. They didn't know anything about me except I had killed a man and Jim had done terrible things to me. The day after Jim's escape a few people trying to give me a hug or just put their hand on my shoulder. But I shrank away from them, frightened. Touch scared me now. Which was new. I wasn't like that before everything happened.

But I felt safe. Mary told me not to leave the compound, which was fine. A few big buildings, some rail road cars, a lot of planter boxes, and a good fence. Parts of it were rent-a-fence, but at some point they brought in a cement truck and make sure it was sturdy. I mean, most of it was still chain link, but it would hold against a dozen or so dead ones. Enough it could be defended. They even had two giant propane tanks, one at each entrance of the compound. They saved the fuel in case they needed to do some welding or to run machinery, but the propane made me feel modern, like a real human.

I didn't really contribute anything to Terminus. I mean, they had me do a lot of cleaning, and I did most of the weeding in the planter boxes. But I didn't hunt, or kill dead ones, or even have to hang out with the other teenagers. There were four of them, but their parents told them to stay away from me. One of the girls decided I was interesting enough to talk to anyway, but I guess the way I looked scared here when she asked if it was true I killed a live person.

I thought about that man a lot. Big. Bearded. Smelly. I don't know what was wrong with him, why he reacted the way he did. Maybe he was drunk. Or Jim and I woke him up. Or he hadn't eaten anything in days. But I don't think he was acting like a normal person when I shot him. Maybe I just told myself that to make myself feel better. I felt bad about killing him. But not as bad as I felt about not killing Jim.

Did that make me a monster? I didn't think so, and I had a lot of time to think about things. Think, and lay out in the sun, and work out. I did push-ups, and planks, and all kinds of calisthenics every day. It was easy with all the bread and rice and beans we had to eat. Some of the Terminians (better than Termites!) were nervous by the fact I kept myself in good shape. Like it meant I was going to kill again. I didn't care. Sooner or later I'd have to be ready. To run, or fight. I didn't have a gun, but I knew where they kept he guns. They kept them locked up, of course, but in an emergency I figured I could get in when everyone else was grabbing one and pick one up before anyone else found the opportunity to argue about it. And I knew where the crowbars were that they used to kill stray walkers that made it all the way to the fence. The crowbars were heavy, and I was still small, but the more I worked out, the more times I could swing one of the crowbars.

Some of the Terminians like to hunt. Some played cards. Others went in groups to plant vegetable patches outside the walls to supplement the planters. Square dancing was big. Martin called out dances with the best of them. Quite the talker, Martin. He and Mary were just about the only Terminians to spend more than a few words on me. Though I don't think Martin's affectionate nickname “killer” made me a lot of other friends. Few of the Terminians seemed interested in martial pursuits. Oh, they patrolled. They stood sentry. But they didn't desperately want to get better at fighting. I did. I wanted to practice with a rifle. Figure out a hand-to-hand weapon I could rely on. But I couldn't. I had to play vulnerable teenager. Which was all too true.

Many of the Terminians worked the radio. Those who were relatively new seemed to like that job the most. Something about offering hope when it meant so much to them to find sanctuary. Still, newcomers were relatively rare. Only nine new community members arrived in the month after I joined Terminus. In the same time one person died of a heart attack, and another was bitten by dead ones outside of the walls. The Terminians fixed him a venison last supper, paid him respect, and then Gareth, Mary's son, shot him in the back of the head. That surprised me. I expected an exile or something less active from the Terminians.

I'm not sure why so few people showed up. Certainly the radio messages were broadcast as often as the few solar panels still working allowed. The flu seemed to have hit this part of Georgia even worse than eastern Alabama. And the former members of the 224th carefully avoided talking about the early days, or the general lack of the living. I got the feeling the military may have hurt more than it helped while it was still a going concern. In any case the flu, dead ones, massacres, and apparently a poison gas surprise attack between rival military units decimated Rome's population before the 224th even arrived in town.

One way or another, the smallness of the community and the number of refugees was a topic of conversation. Some of the Terminians were concerned that another group might be intercepting arrivals, preying on the supplies carried by the refugees seeking Terminus. There was talk of patrols. Surprisingly, the military contingent was the most against sending parties beyond the area frequented by Terminus' hunters. Seven of Terminus' founders were from the military forces trying to hold the granary back at the beginning of the end of the world. They deserted for various reasons. Some didn't want to kill the militia group that thought it should own the granary. Some ran from the dead ones. Mary was the 224th's communications specialist. She monitored the radio, the first to hear about each new unit being overrun or abandoning the chain of command. She knew the truth about massacres in Atlanta, about hundreds of thousands of civilians killed to “protect” the CDC. Before they turned. She knew the commander of the 224th never received orders to garrison Rome. He just knew about the bread factory and its granary and wanted it for himself. Everyone said a dead one got the Major. But I doubted it.

In any case, Mary found out her son Gareth was still alive, the Major died, and a few soldiers joined her in abandoning the battle around the granary. A few townsfolk, mostly Gareth's friends, like Martin, joined Mary and her deserters and they decided to sit on the rail line and proclaim sanctuary for all who were willing to found a new community. Dead ones and fear won the three-way battle, and Terminus inherited the granary by default.

The granary was better than a gold mine. It held enough food to feed the community for years. And as far as anyone could tell it hadn't been damaged in the battle – the grain wouldn't rot unless someone screwed up. But after a month of meals in Terminus I didn't care how good the sourdough was. It was obvious the community had a problem. And that problem was protein. Other nutrients, too. The hunters really didn't bring back much meat. The area was hunted out. Few fish came out of the river. Contaminated as the river was by the bone yards and the military equipment leeching who knows what into into the water and few people wanted to eat the fish we could catch anyway. The planters that weren't given over to vegetables to provide other nutrients grew beans. But the few cows the Terminians found inevitably died to dead ones and, well, everyone had a very high-starch diet. I even pitched the idea of growing mushrooms inside the compound, using compost to provide the feed. But we didn't have any spores or whatever to get started.

Perhaps because of the high-starch diet, I put on a few pounds. This was good. I didn't want to be rail-thin. Rail-thin meant being that much closer to starving to death. But gaining a little weight also scared me. It scared me to my bones. I hadn't been keeping close watch on the passing days, but it had been at least seven weeks since my last period. Did I gain weight because I was trying to, because I was eating a lot. Or did I gain weight because I was pregnant with Jim's child? A long time ago my mother told me an irregular period could be a sign of malnutrition. I held out hope.

Finally, one evening I was laying on top of the warehouse's roof, far away from everyone who didn't like a mild scent of tar, looking at Venus and waiting for the rest of the stars to come out. A quick shooting pain ran through my abdomen and then I was crippled by a monster cramp. When the pain stopped I felt wetness in my crotch. I stuck my hand down my pants, then brought my fingers up to my face so I could look at them closely.

Blood, glorious blood. I was unclean! I don't know why it popped into my head that way. Some old orthodox Hindu warning about not going to temple during that time of the month. Who cares! I had my period. I was bleeding! I would have cried tears of joy, reveled in the relief from fear, but another monster cramp hit me and instead I endured the pain.

My flow was heavy, and after the second cramp I realized I better do something or my pants would be irrevocably stained. I got up and carefully, carefully, made my way across the plank bridge to the main building. Then I waited for another cramp before climbing down the ladder making my way to the kitchen, and grabbing a rag from the pile there. I stepped inside the bathroom (still working!) to shove the rag into my underwear and went to find Mary.

Mary was outside, partnered with Mandy against Gareth and Martin in a vicious game of spades. I waited for them to finish their hand, before interrupting, figuring the failing light would cut short their fun anyway. With a huge grin on my face, I announced in a very happy voice “I'm bleeding,” and held up the fingers that still had a little dried blood on them.

Martin looked up with concern. “What's wrong, killer?”

“Nothing. I finally got my period!” This immediately grossed out Martin and Gareth, who made faces and shocked noises. I found this hilarious. Even cramps couldn't contain my joy.

“Congratulations?” Mandy asked.

Mary's face lit up with understanding, and I explained to Mandy: “I'm not pregnant!”

“That's great, Amrita,” Martin offered as he and Gareth got up from the table and beat a hasty retreat, obviously not in the mood to talk about menstruation. It occurred to me that I would never have talked about my body so openly, especially given the reason I feared being pregnant, before the apocalypse. Have enough near-death experiences and you stop caring about a lot of the social niceties. 

Mary gave me a hug. “I'm so happy for you!”

“So, uh, what do we Terminians do when we get our period? All I have right now is a rag and I don't think it's going to catch all of it.”

“I think all the proper pads and tampons are claimed right now,” Mary said sympathetically.

“We don't have a communal supply,” said Mandy. “I know Marlene has a box of Kotex Ulta-thins, but I doubt she'd give up one for anything less than a steak dinner.”

“We'll right up something that'll work. A few rags placed just so, and a proper loincoth to hold them in place. Not just underwear elastic.” Some people found Mary brusque, and some of the dumber men complained she was domineering. Say what you will about her, she was usually the first to help out someone with a problem.

True to her word, Mary taught me how to tie a loincloth so my make-shift pad would stay in place. The cramps kept me from sleeping well, but I was so happy to have them, it didn't bother me. Then, in the morning, came the big surprise.

After breakfast, Mary found me doing push-ups in the yard. “You'll want to save your strength today, Amrita. We are going out.”

“Hunh?” I stopped and looked up at Mary, not comprehending.

“It's high time you went out on the town,” repeated Mary.

“Outside the walls?” Sometimes I can be a little slow.

Mary nodded and handed me a my .22. “You know how to use this?”

I stood up. “Yes and no.”

“Show me.”

I took the .22 and checked to make sure it was unloaded. I explained the features, how to load it. How to toggle the safety. “But I don't know how to disassemble it to clean it, and my aim is only so-so. I haven't had much practice.”

“You're better off than I expected.” I guess that was a compliment? “I'm going to find Nathan. Get your pack and some water. We'll meet you by the north gate in a few minutes.”

“Nathan's coming with us?” I could put his name to his face, but I didn't know anything about the man.

“He's a good nurse.” Mary gave me a parting smile, but still left without revealing her secrets. I went to get some water, and to see if there was any leftover rice pudding to take as a snack.

Turns out, Martin was eating the last of the rice pudding at that moment. “Whoa, killer. Nice piece. Who gave you the hardware?”

“It's the gun I had on me when I came to Terminus,” I said defensively. “No one had to give it to me. And I didn't take it.”

Martin lifted his hands in mock surrender. “Slow down, Amrita. I just want to make sure you point it at an actual walker this time.” I blushed, shame burning inside me. “I'm a little scruffy today. My own neck's on the line, you know.” Too ashamed to respond, I put the unloaded gun in my back and went to fill up my bottle with water. “You goin' outside?”

I nodded yes. “Mary's taking me somewhere.”

“Ooh. She acts mean. Well, I mean she is mean. Mean momma jomma! Especially to me. But I think she likes you.” Martin grinned. He could talk circles around people, and had a way of looking at the world that was simultaneously strange and eerily accurate. “Where's she taking you?”

“I don't know,” I admitted. “But she went to find Nathan, so he's coming along for some reason.”

“Ah. The plot thickens.” Martin still wore his amused grin. “I'll come along. Just promise to not shoot me,” he finished, mock-seriously.

“I won't shoot you,” I said.

“Thank you.”

Exasperated, I left the kitchen for the north gate. Mary and Nathan were already there. They both had large but empty backpacking gear. Mary carried a military rifle with an attached bayonet, which looked very efficient. Nathan had a pistol and a machete. Nathan was tall, bearded, and barrel-chested. With his weapons and his bald head and graying hair, he looked like a bad-ass Santa Claus. While I admired their weapons, Mary picked up an old-fasioned round trash can lid and handed it to me.

“What am I supposed to do with this.”

“Carry it,” Mary said. “It might come in useful.”

“For holding back trash?” I knew what she wanted me to use it for, I just didn't want to be the lame member of the group.

“I was going to give you a crowbar, but if it comes to hand-to-hand, we're all better off if we don't need to worry about you and we can finish off any dead ones as quickly as possible.” Yes, fine, it made sense. “Plus with that you can defend yourself long enough for us to kill some dead ones without using the .22. We're not going far, so we don't want to use our guns if we can avoid it.”

Yes, you have good reason to think I shoot too easily. I picked up the lid and held it awkwardly. The handle was in the center of the lid, which wasn't really the most convenient place for carrying it a good distance.

“Cool, a shield,” Martin remarked. “That should keep her from popping off rounds.” Damn it.

“Where are you going?” Mary asked.

“With you,” Martin said. “I want to see killer in action.”

Mary grunted in disgust. Even though they were both members of the three-person council that issued rulings and made group decisions, Mary and Martin didn't like each other that much. Martin's never ending commentary on life and current events rubbed some people the wrong way. Still, they did a good job running Terminus. For the most part, they let people figure out what needed to be done. And they gave lazy people the tasks no one else wanted, which meant people weren't lazy. Mary was the soul of Terminus, its conscience. Everyone trusted her. Martin was the thinker, and he was charismatic. He could win people over and come up with unusual ideas. And Alex. Well, Alex kept track of all the little details. He denied having been an accountant before the apocalypse, but I had my doubts.

“Fine,” conceded Mary. “But get geared up.”

“I'm good,” Martin said. He had grabbed a crowbar on the way over, but nothing else. “Someone's got to carry the nice pack we find out there on a dead one.”

“Do you have a gun with you?”

“Hey, Barry!” Martin called out, addressing a Termininan on his way back from the river. Barry was an engineer, he was probably coming back from checking on the little waterwheel and pump that kept our water reserves topped off. “Toss me your Glock, I'm headed out.” Barry gave him a thumbs-up, and headed over to meet us. “Yep. I'm bringing a sweet Glock out on our little adventure,” Martin said. Mary just shook her head. We started walking along the tracks north after Barry gave Martin his gun and went back inside the compound.

“So, Amrita,” Mary said, “did you take sex-ed before it all went to shit?”

“Did I... what” I said, as Martin waggled his eyebrows.

“Ooh, la-la.”

“Did you take sexual education in school?”

“There was a three-day bit where our health teacher got really nervous, talked about HIV, told all of us to never have sex and said abstinence a lot.”

“Oh, for Christ's sake. Where did you go to school?” Mary paused. “Well, I guess it doesn't matter any more”

“Utah,” I answered anyway.

“That explains that,” Nathan muttered.

“Do you know anything about birth control?” Mary continued.

“A little,” I said. “After my fifteenth birthday my mother told me about condoms. That I should never have sex without a condoms unless the guy had been tested. That I was too young to have sex, but I should know about birth control. Then just before she or I died of embarrassment she told me she'd sent me an e-mail. It had a link to an article online that showed how to properly use a condom. With pictures. We never talked about it again.”

“Not bad. I give her a 6,” Martin opined. “Better than my dad, who just told me he'd give me a whuppin' if I got a girl pregnant.”

“I knew some older girls who were on the pill,” I added. “Some of them said the hormones made them feel off.”

“All right,” said Mary. “Ever hear of an IUD?”

“Uh,” I delayed, racking my brain to come up with an answer so I wouldn't have to admit to ignorance. “No. IED, yes. IUD, no.”

That got a laugh from all three of them. I didn't find it funny.

“Intra-Uterine Device,” Mary told me. “A little T-shaped thing with a copper coil. You put it in your uterus, and you can't get pregnant.”

“Your uterus?”

“Yes.”

“Uh, that's kind of far up there.”

Mary looked at me, not getting my concern. “Yes, the uterus is above the vagina.”

I waited for Martin to make a vagina joke. He didn't. “Well, why wouldn't people just use a condom instead of putting something into the woman's uterus if they wanted to have sex.”

“She's got you there, Mary,” Martin said.

“Are you even keeping watch?” Mary asked. She was constantly scanning ahead of us. I occasionally glanced behind us, like I was supposed to.

“Yes,” Martin said, glancing to our left.

“We're headed to 'Redmond Medical Group East',” Mary told me. “The hospital across the river, near the granary, is still overrun with dead ones. What's left of it after the airstrike, anyway. We've already cleaned out Riverbend Medical Center, the largest set of doctor's offices and testing labs near here. That was pretty stocked, so we haven't needed much. But Redmond Medical Group East is close. And they used to advertise female-care.”

“Aww, I was hoping were we going shoe-shopping at the bowling alley,” Martin joked. Nathan chuckled.

“No,” Mary said.

“Can we go bowling anyway?” Martin asked. “Just one game.” I wasn't sure if he was serious or not.

“No,” Mary said. “Since they advertised female-care, the clinic might have birth control on hand. Unfortunately, Rome didn't have a Planned Parenthood. Now, with a condom, you have to use one every time you have sex. An IUD is put in by a doctor, and it stays up there. You don't put it in and out each time you have sex, it just stays up there all the time. They're safe, and generally speaking the only side effect is slightly heavier flow during your period. An IUD will last for years. For, uh...”

“Ten to twelve years for the copper ones,” Nathan supplied.

“The perfect end-of-the-world birth control. If you're still alive in twelve years you can think about it again then. Now, maybe we'll find one. Maybe we won't. But if we do, you'll have a decision to make. Think about it.”

I thought about it. Now I knew why Mary invited me a long. She probably decided to scout out the clinic today after I told her I wasn't pregnant last night. Well, did I want it? A heavier flow, which probably meant worse cramps during my period, didn't sound great. And I wasn't planning on having sex with anyone. Ever. Then again, I hadn't planned on having sex with Jim. A shiver went through me despite the sun shining on us, and I looked around for him. I was outside the walls. Maybe Jim was out here and I could kill him.

No such luck. “There's a couple of biters next to the ATM. Behind the red car.” There was a bowling alley, farther up the tracks on the left. We were approaching a major street, with a bridge across the river to our left, a credit union across the street, a Chase bank to our right, and a tobacco store on our left. Apparently the biters preferred mega-banks to credit unions.

“Shit, sorry.” Nathan was responsible for everything to our right.

I readied my shield, but it wasn't necessary. Mary had excellent aim with her bayonet, cleanly taking the first biter through the eye. Nathan hit the second with this machete, but he failed to penetrate the skull. He backed off, leaving the machete embedded in the biter. It could have gotten dicey if the biter had a good lurch in him, but Martin clocked it with a big swing of his crowbar, then smashed it a few more times when it was on the ground. Finally the skull cracked and it stopped moving.

Mary cleaned off her bayonet on the first biter's bath robe, then motioned us close so she could talk to us. “We need to cross route 101 quickly, to minimize the chance that any dead ones on the bridge see us and bring over a bunch of friends. There might not be a group on the other side waiting for a snack, but why risk it? The clinic is right over there,” Mary pointed, “second building south from the credit union. We're not going to go in the street-side door we can see from here. Too much time spent visible from the bridge. The back side of the clinic southwest corner of the same parking lot the credit union is on the northwest corner of. We cross the road, keeping along the wall of the credit union until we're past those two wrecked cars. Then we go through the parking lot, keeping well away of any cars we can't see from here. If there's five or more dead ones in the parking lot, we turn around and come back here and then to the tracks, breaking their sight-line. If there's four or less, Nathan, Martin and I will take them out immediately, while Amrita watches for additional dangers coming from houses, the credit union, under cars, whatever.

“We enter the clinic from the other side, through the parking lot. We'll probably have to break some glass, we might gather some attention. Martin, you'll keep watch on the outside from our entrance. Amrita will watch your back for danger from the inside. Nathan and I will clean out any dead ones from the clinic, but always remember we can miss something. If we get too much attention, we'll run for it. Once we're settled inside we have two ways out. We're more likely to attract attention at the parking-lot side of things, which will probably leave the street-side exit free. That's closer to making a run for Terminus anyway.” Mary looked at each of us to make sure we'd been paying attention. I wanted to be her in that moment, especially with two men listening to her directions and taking her seriously. “Any questions?”

Nathan nodded his head no, Martin saluted, and I said “I understand. Stay clear of cars. Look for dangers when we get to the parking lot. Watch Martin's back in the clinic.”

Mary nodded. “Let's go.” Bending low, she moved swiftly towards the credit union. I ran to keep up.

Of course, with a good plan, we didn't end up running into any resistance. The only thing I saw of note while we stormed the clinic was a bombed out house on the east side of the parking lot. Burnt and jagged brick walls, no roof, like it exploded from the inside. A human ribcage was half-buried in the rubble in the yard, and a stray dog carrying a rat in its teeth hid its prize from us. I pointed out the dog, but it had already seen us and it would be dangerous to run past blind spots trying to kill it for supper. Sorry mom, I have meat cravings now.

Martin found an abandoned backpack holding three cans of green beans and some loose Sweet Tarts covered in ants. He ate the Sweet Tarts immediately, ants and all. Well, he offered one to Mary, who gave him a dirty look. I think she was just irritated he actually found a spare pack after predicting he would when we left.

Lo and behold, we found stuff. Sterile gauze, various bits of equipment, rubber gloves, face masks, local anesthetic, a bunch of isopropyl alcohol, hand sanitizer, a fair amount of orange juice, some Tabasco, and the doctor even had a private stash of Oxycontin in his office. “For trade,” Martin said, in the face of Mary's withering stare. “Or someone the dead ones bite.”

Mary ended up putting the Oxycontin in her pack. “Alex keeps it, and keeps track of it.”

We also found birth-control. Condoms, some weird rubber cap things, and three copper IUDs. Strangely, I wasn't embarrassed when I told the group that, yes, I did want one. Mary made Martin join her keeping watch, although he pretended he wanted to watch the insertion “for educational purposes only.”

That left Nathan and I alone in an examining room, where I had to take off my pants and my underwear. I felt uncomfortable doing that in front of a man. Especially an old man who didn't look like a nurse. But I trusted Mary. Nathan put on gloves, then sterilized the glove and some equipment with alcohol. He spread me open with a strange metal instrument, use a flashlight to look inside me, and I had a weird moment where I expected a biter to burst out of one of the cabinets in the room. Then he put the IUD, which looked like a little arrow symbol, inside me, shoved, and I yelled out in sudden pain. And that was pretty much it. Nathan explained how it could be taken out. I digested the fact that there would be string hanging out of my uterus for who-knows how long. And Nathan didn't even complain that menstrual blood made the whole procedure kind of messy. I decided I liked old-man nurses. I wondered how he became a nurse.

“It hurt?” Mary asked.

“Yep,” I said.

“That's normal,” Nathan reassured us. “Cervixes are sensitive.”

“I'm happy for you,” Mary said. “I mean, I hope you never need it. Or, not never. I hope you, later, need it for a good...” she trailed off, not quite sure what she was saying. To my surprise, I was overwhelmed by love for her at that moment. Just the fact someone cared enough about me to teach me something important and look after me meant everything. Luckily, Mary's rifle and bayonet were slung on her back, so I could rush forward and bury myself in a hug. For the first time in a long time, touching someone felt good, and not horrible. Mary hugged me back, and I tried to hold onto the strange, wonderful feeling of happiness.


	20. Storytime

“For me, it was easy. I had a bunch of reports. Hell, they were collated. Our intelligence officer typed 'em up real nice. A few pages from the National Institutes of Health, a few pages from the Center for Disease Control, some instructions from USNORTHCOM, a list of attached units from...”

“Hold up, hold up. We're in Georgia. Why was you takin' orders from the north?” It figured Billy would be the one the interrupt. No one in Terminus fit the southern Bubba stereotype as much as Billy.

“North, as in North America,” Mary explained. United States Northern Command covers Canada, the U.S., and Mexico.

“Sounds like the U.S. military,” joked Anders, who was from Europe. “One country is too small for a U.S. general.”

At the same time, Billy exclaimed: “Mexico! What's the Mexicans got to do with it?”

Mary looked like she felt bad for Billy. “Next time we invade Mexico, it'll be USNORTHCOM that makes sure it goes well.”

“Well that don't seem likely no more.”

“Mmm,” Mary continued. “In this nice neat collated packet I found out there were dead ones, that they didn't have any of the personality of when they were alive, that we didn't know jack shit about what caused them. Hell, the CDC guy practically speculated it was an alien bio-weapon. All this information about where the strongest outbreaks were, which was just where we good information coming in, which meant it was everywhere. All that, and not a single warning to SHOOT THEM IN THE HEAD.” Nathan groaned in disgust, obviously feeling the bureaucratic stupid.

“I swear to god the first batch of ten or so we came across, the lead Bradley shot them up with the machine gun. Everyone looked at each other like maybe they were murderers. Then the grunts in the back got out so they wouldn't have to sit in there and bake and three of them got bit on the ankle by what was left of the dead ones. And come nightfall those three probably took out five others wherever they were medevaced too.”

“Anyway, I knew how to deal with them before I ran across them because I worked communications. Talking to neighboring units, sharing supplies, etc. But proper doctrine, figuring out how to do things right, that takes weeks. Months, even. People gotta look at action reports. Make suggestions. Go up and down the chain of command. I had common sense way before command or the intelligence guys know what the hell they were doing.”

Mary looked down at her feet, ashamed. “When soldiers don't know what to do, they get scared. They didn't know who they could catch it from, how to tell a dead one from a living person. The boys shot up a hundred or so people on the second day. Half a town ran at our column, rushed us. They just hoped we had clean water, 'cause there was a rumor the dead ones came from a chemical spill in the water supply. Fracking, or some such. But they boys just thought it was a pack of 'infected'. They let loose.” Mary closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to shake the memories free so she wouldn't have to see the bodies anymore.

“So, lucky I guess. I never had to deal with them without knowing how. But only because of a bunch of fucked up shit that happened to other people.”

I had told Jasper's story of not wanting to run over biters after Billy came back with a truly shocking amount of rotting flesh on the front of his truck. I was trying to lighten the mood after Mary made him park his car well outside of Terminus. Billy wasn't happy about that. I succeeded in distracting everybody, but I wouldn't say I lightened the mood.

“I was there,” Billy said, causing Mary to look up in surprise. “We ain't had no problems yet. Just a bunch of crazy shit on TV. Sommerville's a little nowhere town. We's the county seat. Got a courthouse, sure. But the Walmart shut down a year ago. Everyone was scared dead ones would be all over, what with people driving in from farms talking about who knows what. Rumor went around that it was in the water. Lafayette had it real bad. Probably 'cause it got hit by the flu. We had a bunch of people come down, say the water was doin' this to everyone. So we was scared, 'cause we're downstream of Lafayette.

Billy sighed, wanting to be done with the story, “bunch of people were at the county building, demanding something was done. The council was making all kinds of promises, like they do. They sayin' they askin' for help; councilwoman told us the national guard was coming. It wouldn't happen in Sommerville, no sir, and we'd all get clean water.

“They y'all pulled up. An' it was hot. And some loud mouth cracks 'I hope they brought enough for everyone.' That's what done it. Everyone though you brought water an' it'd run out before they got some.” Billy shook his head, marveling at people and their stupidity. “I didn't believe it for a second. It was them damn environmentalists thought it was the water in the first place. Global warming. What a crock of shit.” Mary and I shared a glance, amazed at how well Billy's ignorance served him. “Anyway, I already nicked four of them five-gallon suckers they had by the water cooler in the county clerk's office. Next thing I know, all hell breaks loose. It was louder than a spring hailstorm on a tin roof. And the county council and most them people was dead.”

“Wat zonde!,” exclaimed Anders, but there was enough shock and sorrow in his voice that we knew what he meant.

“Anyways, I went out the back and got home quick as I could, an I figured y'all didn't stay around neither. Ain't no one wants to look at that more'n once. That night I saw the councilwoman an' a bunch of other dead ones movin' around, bullet holes and all. First time I seen 'em. They saw us, too. My roommate tried to fight 'em when they broke in the windows, but I figured you can't kill somethin' twice. So I went to the basement and locked the door.” Mary and I shared another glance. “Aw, it warn't like that. I waited by the door, but he didn't come knockin' or callin' out. There was just scratching.” We shared a quiet moment for the poor dumb bastard who used to be Billy's roommate.

“I had a radio down there, an' plenty of Chef Boyardee. So I got the skinny from The Last Radioman 'till he shut down an' I heard Terminus broadcast. Then I come here.” Billy paused, suddenly nervous. An' somethin' else I ain't never told you before. I learned something on the way here. I didn't wanna say nothin', cause, well...”

“It's okay, Billy. We all had to do things to get here,” Mary said. Billy nodded, and glanced at me before continuing. That gave me goosebumps. Mary and Martin like me, and the Terminians didn't fear me anymore. But I was still the girl who murdered someone.

“Well my roommate ended up under his bed. I guess they started eatin', and he was tryin' to get away. When I found him he snapped at me, but he couldn't get to me 'cause the rest of 'em ate his legs before they didn't want any more. I got a big 'ole sledgehammer from the garage 'cause I wanted something hefty. I missed a few times before I put him down. An' I hit the body first, 'cause I didn't know it had to be the head. Anyway, I left the house with an old baseball bat, but I also hat a bunch of my roommate all over my front.” I was suddenly happy we were discussing this before dinner, not after. I still had to struggle to avoid dry-heaving.

“I decided to get some good clothes from next door, an' my next door neighbor was still there. Well, not there. Dead one. But he didn't do nothin'. I stood there watchin' him, an' he watched me, and then I clocked him with the bat a few times. His wife, too. But I change clothes, get his keys, and mother-in-law was all over me like flies on shit. They must've locked her in there or somethin', but she sure didn't ignore me like they did.” Billy shrugged. “They leave you alone if you got a bunch of blood 'n guts smeared all over. Sorry I didn't tell you. Thought you'd shoot me, like if'n I got bit.”

“That's okay, Billy.” Mary said. “I'm, uh, not sure how often we'll want to use that.” Never, ever. “But it's good to know.” Mary nodded reassuringly, letting Billy know she wouldn't see him as unclean. I already did, but he didn't need to know that.

“You will never catch me smearing undead on myself!” I looked around for the person who joined the conversation without me noticing. Jesse, standing behind me. Short, dark-colored black woman. Somehow her clothes were never wrinkled. It was like magic. “That's just asking to get infected.”

“We were sharing beginning stories,” Mary explained. “And Billy's trick might be worth trying if you're cornered and desperate.

“Tsk, tsk. No need to be cornered and desperate,” Jesse said. “Everyone's beginning stories are all the same. Chaos, running, pure dumb luck. “Know what I did?”

“No,” said Mary, looking amused. “What did you do?”

“Yeah,” said Billy, “did you clean your nails carefully after offing a dead one?” He was just ribbing, not trying to be mean.

“No. I kept my wits about me. I made a plan.” Mary adopted a schooling attitude, like she was going to teach us a lesson. “Reports of strange things were coming in from all over the globe well before any emergency announcement. Any one of them sounded like a crazy conspiracy theory, so people discounted them. But any half-decent analysis would show similar conspiracy theories were popping up in extremely disparate cultural geographies. Sure, people from the Middle East will believe anything. But no matter how crazy it sounds, if you get reports of the same phenomenon from Iraq, Vietnam, South Africa, and Slovenia, well, there's something too it. That grouping of people is too culturally different to come up with the same made-up story. And, with the truth of things established, one realizes instantly that there is a world-wide phenomenon, and thus no possibility of containment.

“So I rented a full-size van and I drove to the grocery store.” Jesse said this like it was a big deal. “On Tuesday. When it was basically empty. And I filled up with water and as much food as I could fit in the van. Non-perishables, because one should always account for the possibility of making a mistake.”

“How does buying non-perishable food prepare you for a mistake,” I asked.

“Back in the old world, supermarkets took returns,” Jesse explained.

“I didn't know that,” said Nathan.

Jesse shrugged. “So I took that van to my brother's house. He's an asshole, but he has a lot of guns and a couple of daughters who can shoot. I asked if I could stay at his house, which is out in the country, and gave him money to buy a lot of ammo. Over the next few days, I learned to shoot and I bought a lot more supplies as it became clear things were going to get really bad. I saw my first dead one a week after I had collated internet reports. That was still fairly lucky. Things were really bad in the cities at that point. My niece shot it after I looked it over with binoculars.”

“Aiesha is a great shot. Good at soccer, too,” Jesse nodded over at the other side of the compound, where a few kids were kicking around a ball. “Me, not so much. But it didn't matter. We shooed off a few refugees, not letting them get close to the house without a warning shot. We killed the odd stray walker. By the time one of our gunshots attracted too many, we were six weeks into it, knew about Terminus, and had added it to our list of evacuation plans.

“I didn't have to kill my first undead until I ran it over with my van on the way here.” Jesse pointed at Billy, “and we had the sense to stop by a stream and use a bucket to rinse off the front of the van before showing up at Terminus' gates. After scouting out women and children, with no one the wiser.” I couldn't help myself; it wasn't the most exciting story, but I was impressed.

“Actually, Martin radioed that you were on your way after he saw you washing off the van,” Mary corrected her. “We did not expect you to be so well-stocked with gifts when you arrived, though.”

“Do you, uh, think Jesse should be on the logistics and supply committee,” Anders asked.

Mary nodded. “I'm thinking so.” This seemed to please Jesse.

“Your turn, Anders,” Billy said. I was also curious. Anders had a thick German accent. Though if you asked him about it he would frown and tell you it was a Dutch accent. Same thing, as far as I could tell. In any case, maybe it would be an unusual story.

Anders shrugged. “I came to Atlanta for business. Vanderlande Industries.” The company name rolled off his tongue like music.

“Van-what-now?” asked Billy.

“Vanderlande Industries. Logistics. Shipping things to places, on time, factory and warehouse efficiency.” Despite the accent, Anders was clearly used to doing business in English. “We do a fair amount of work in Georgia, in the ports and in Atlanta. Samsung contracted us to help make sure their new phone roll-out went smoothly. But that just brought me to Georgia. I flew in from Amsterdam. And then customs grabbed me.

“Stupid, so very stupid,” Anders muttered. “They claimed quarantine and locked up all the foreigners from the flight. But they let the American citizens go. How can you quarantine if you let most of the incoming people go free? The airport closed two hours after we arrived. First two days, they bought food from the shops in the airport. Third day, water only. On the fourth day, all of us were so hungry we started yelling at the guard to let us go. Not even a TSA guard. Army, I think. Young.” Anders looked down at his feet, no longer talking.

“Go on,” Mary said gently, “it's all right.”

“Several of us were angry. Very angry. We didn't know much, except an epidemic was sweeping the globe. But no medical people came to check us out. We smelled. No showers, just a bathroom. We were scared. We started to go up to her, the guard, to yell at her. She aimed her gun at us, told us to stay back. We stayed back, but kept yelling that she couldn't keep us there without food. She... she cried. Tears. Told us all we were right.”

Anders took a deep breath, steeling himself. “Then she looked up, raised her gun, and opened fire. Full machine gun. She missed me. Others.... So many died. So loud. Then silence. No one moved. No one could believe what just happened. It was like the movies. A blood-film. Uh, a horror-movie. Then,” Anders shivered, despite himself, “she started to reload. Just like that. Take out the old clip, reach for the new. We ran at her. The survivors did. We got there first. We tore at her. Beat her to death.

Anders took a deep breath, now that he was past the worst of it. “Then, we did the stupidest thing. We waited. Waited for the other soldiers to come and kill us all. Surely, that was the only possibility. But no one came. Slowly, slowly, we opened doors with the guard's key and made our way out into the airport. No one. She was the only one there. Everyone else... gone. Abandoned us. Planes kept landing. And taking off. But all of them went to the private side of the airport, not the international terminal. Most were military. The international terminal, the TSA offices, empty. No food there, either.

“Half of us just left. The other half knew we didn't have anywhere to go. The shops, bars, were all ransacked. The half of us that stayed figured our best bet was here. We looked at the KLM terminal, found the Skyteam operations. There it was. Food. Wonderful airline food, still refrigerated, ready to be loaded on airplanes that would never fly again. I had the first-class chicken, two meals, heated up in a Wendy's microwave in the terminal building. It tasted good.

“While I ate, I figured out the guard. Why she did what she did. Only one explanation: bravery. She was stupid, but brave. She thought she had to keep us there, away from everyone else, to keep America safe. Only reason she would stay when all the others abandoned their post. She probably already considered herself dead, figured she was protecting her family when she shot us.” Anders shook his head; the rest of us were somber. “Stupid waste.”

“When did you see your first dead one,” I asked.

“After I ate. The people she shot. Some of them... got up. None of us knew. We were only told an epidemic. I just ran,” Anders admitted. “Too strange, after everything else. I ran until I made my way to the parking lot outside. More of them were there. A few, walking through the cars. I think after so many days the city was quiet enough they were finally drawn to the military planes. I could hear shooting, too. Maybe military. I looked for a taxi.” Anders laughed, a little genuine levity. “I really did!”

“There weren't any taxis. So I ran. And ran. And ran. I saw tanks on the snelweg, er, freeway on-ramps. Soldiers on the rail line, watching the access points. Some of them took pot shots at the dead. Some at me, I think. I hid behind cars, went north. All the access points, watched. Like I said. But nothing stopping dead ones from just walking across the freeway, most of it is ground-level. I did the same thing, going the other way, working it out as I ran. So many dode mannen. Shot, bit, cut. Dode. Dead. I knew then.

“I could only run so far. Many dode mannen followed. Soon, before I could no more run, I found a cemetery. Dead get up, want to leave a cemetery.” Anders shook his head, amused at his thinking back then. “I hid in a... dead man's house. Stone building, for a family.”

“Mausoleum,” Jesse supplied.

“Oh,” Anders said. “It is the same word in Dutch. I though different. I hid inside a mausoleum. Hide from the dead with the dead. The skeletons were still there. I checked the next day.. But they didn't move. And the stone door stopped the dead ones. They couldn't see me, couldn't smell me. It was dark. Very dark. I just laid on the floor, waiting. My eyes adjusted in the night. I saw little cracks of daylight the next day. I opened the door and blinded myself. Later, very hungry, I left. I broke into a house. Ate. Stole keys, and drove for the countryside. I didn't make it. The army stopped me. They were going to take me to the refugee center.”

“Ooh,” Mary made an unpleasant face. Billy and Jesse grimaced. The refugee center didn't have a good reputation.

“They changed their mind. They decided a foreigner didn't qualify for help. They took my car, but let me go. I walked. And walked. Two days, through woods and golf courses. I found a little food, and some danger at the golf courses. But by then I knew they could lose interest. I'd run, get distance, break their view of me, then change direction. I was ready to collapse when I found Eastside Baptist Church. By Carrolton.” He said the name, assuming people would know where Carrolton was. I didn't. “They took me in, fed me. Good people.”

“What happened,” asked Billy, when Anders didn't continue. He wasn't afraid of being blunt.

“We did well,” Anders said. “Until sickness hit. The sickness, and people.”


End file.
